The Silent Barrier

“Please do. I am in chastened mood.”

“I wish I was skilled in the trick of words, then I might say something real cute. As it is, I can only supply a sort of condensed statement, – something about a nymph, a moonlit lake, the spirit of the glen, – nice catchy phrases every one, – with a line thrown in from Shelley about an ‘orbéd maiden with white fire laden.’ Let me go back a hundred yards, Miss Wynton, and I shall return with the whole thing in order.”

“With such material I believe you would bring me a sonnet.”

“No. I hail from the wild and woolly West, where life itself is a poem; so I stick to prose. There is a queer sort of kink in human nature to account for that.”

“On the principle that a Londoner never hears the roar of London, I suppose?”

“Exactly. An old lady I know once came across a remarkable instance of it. She watched a ship-wreck, the real article, with all the scenic accessories, and when a half drowned sailor was dragged ashore she asked him how he felt at that awful moment. And what do you think he said?”

“Very wet,” laughed Helen.

“No, that is the other story. This man said he was very dry.”

“Ah, the one step from the sublime to the ridiculous, which reminds me that if I remain here much longer talking nonsense I shall lose the good opinion I am sure you have formed of me from Mr. Mackenzie’s letter. Why, it must be after eleven o’clock! Are you going any farther, or will you walk with me to the hotel?”

“If you will allow me – ”

“Indeed, I shall be very glad of your company. I came out to escape my own thoughts. Did you ever meet such an unsociable lot of people as our fellow boarders, Mr. Spencer? If it was not for my work, and the fact that I have taken my room for a month, I should hie me forthwith to the beaten track of the vulgar but good natured tourist.”

“Why not go? Let me help you to-morrow to map out a tour. Then I shall know precisely where to waylay you, for I feel the chill here too.”

“I wish I could fall in with the first part of your proposal, though the second rather suggests that you regard Mr. Mackenzie’s letter of introduction as a letter of marque.”

“At any rate, I am an avowed pirate,” he could not help retorting. “But to keep strictly to business, why not quit if you feel like wandering?”

“Because I was sent here, on a journalistic mission which I understand less now than when I received it in London. Of course, I am delighted with the place. It is the people I – kick at? Is that a quite proper Americanism?”

“It seems to fit the present case like a glove, or may I say, like a shoe?”

“Now you are laughing at me, inwardly of course, and I agree with you. Ladies should not use slang, nor should they promenade alone in Swiss valleys by moonlight. My excuse is that I did not feel sleepy, and the moon tempted me. Good night.”

They were yet some little distance from the hotel, and Spencer was at a loss to account for this sudden dismissal. She saw the look of bewilderment in his face.

“I have found a back stairs door,” she explained, with a smile. “I really don’t think I should have dared to come out at half-past ten if I had to pass the Gorgons in the foyer.”

She flitted away by a side path, leaving Spencer more convinced than ever that he had blundered egregiously in dragging this sedate and charming girl from the quiet round of existence in London to the artificial life of the Kursaal. Some feeling of unrest had driven her forth to commune with the stars. Was she asking herself why she was denied the luxuries showered on the doll-like creatures whose malicious tongues were busy the instant Bower set foot in the hotel? It would be an ill outcome of his innocent subterfuge if she returned to England discontented and rebellious. She was in “chastened mood,” she had said. He wondered why? Had Bower been too confident, – too sure of his prey to guard his tongue? Of all the unlooked for developments that could possibly be bound up with the harmless piece of midsummer madness that sent Helen Wynton to Switzerland, surely this roué’s presence was the most irritating and perplexing.

Then from the road came another stanza from the wine bibbers, now homeward bound. They were still howling about Margharita in long sustained cadences. And Spencer knew his Faust. It was to the moon that the lovesick maiden confided her dreams, and Mephisto was at hand to jog the elbow of his bewitched philosopher at exactly the right moment.

Spencer threw his cigar into the gurgling rivulet of the Inn. He condemned Switzerland, and the Upper Engadine, and the very great majority of the guests in the Kursaal, in one emphatic malediction, and went to his room, hoping to sleep, but actually to lie awake for hours and puzzle his brains in vain effort to evolve a satisfying sequel to the queer combination of events he had set in motion when he ran bare headed into the Strand after Bower’s motor car.

CHAPTER VIII

SHADOWS

“It is a glorious morning. If the weather holds, your first visit to the real Alps should be memorable,” said Bower.

Helen had just descended the long flight of steps in front of the hotel. A tender purple light filled the valley. The nearer hills were silhouetted boldly against a sky of primrose and pink; but the misty depths where the lake lurked beneath the pines had not yet yielded wholly to the triumph of the new day. The air had a cold life in it that invigorated while it chilled. It resembled some vin frappé of rare vintage. Its fragrant vivacity was ready to burst forth at the first encouraging hint of a kindlier temperature.

“Why that dubious clause as to the weather?” asked Helen, looking at the golden shafts of sunlight on the topmost crags of Corvatsch and the Piz della Margna. Those far off summits were so startlingly vivid in outline that they seemed to be more accessible than the mist shrouded ravines cleaving their dun sides. It needed an effort of the imagination to correct the erring testimony of the eye.

“The moods of the hills are variable, my lady, – femininely fickle, in fact. There is a proverb that contrasts the wind with woman’s mind; but the disillusioned male who framed it evidently possessed little knowledge of weather changes in the high Alps, or else he – ”

“Did you beguile me out of my cozy room at six o’clock on a frosty morning to regale me with stale jibes at my sex?”

“Perish the thought, Miss Wynton! My only intent was to explain that the ancient proverb maker, meaning to be rude, might have found a better simile.”

“Meanwhile, I am so cold that the only mood left in my composition is one of impatience to be moving.”

“Well, I am ready.”

“But where is our guide?”

“He has gone on in front with the porter.”

“Porter! What is the man carrying?”

“The wherewithal to refresh ourselves when we reach the hut.”

“Oh,” said Helen, “I had no idea that mountaineering was such a business. I thought the essentials were a packet of sandwiches and a flask.”

“You will please not be flippant. Climbing is serious work. And you must moderate your pace. If you walk at that rate from here to Forno, you will be very, very ill before you reach the hut.”

“Ill! How absurd!”

“Not only absurd but disagreeable, – far worse than crossing the Channel. Even old hands like me are not free from mountain sickness, though it seizes us at higher altitudes than we shall reach to-day. In the case of a novice, anything in the nature of hurrying during the outward journey is an unfailing factor.”

They were crossing the golf links, and the smooth path was tempting to a good walker. Helen smiled as she accommodated herself to Bower’s slower stride. Though the man might possess experience, the woman had the advantage of youth, the unattainable, and this wonderful hour after dawn was stirring its ichor in her veins.

“I suppose that is what Stampa meant when he took ‘Slow and Sure’ for his motto,” she said.

“Stampa! Who is Stampa?”

There was a sudden rasp of iron in his voice. As a rule Bower spoke with a cultivated languor that almost veiled the staccato accents of the man of affairs. Helen was so surprised by this unwarranted clang of anger that she looked at him with wide open eyes.

“He is the driver I told you of, the man who took the wheel off my carriage during the journey from St. Moritz,” she explained.

“Oh, of course. How stupid of me to forget! But, by the way, did you mention his name?”

“No, I think not. Someone interrupted me. Mr. Dunston came and spoke to you – ”

He laughed gayly and drew in deep breaths of the keen air. He was carrying his ice ax over his left shoulder. With his right hand he brushed away a disturbing thought. “By Jove! yes! Dunston dragged me off to open a bank at baccarat, and you will be glad to hear that I won five hundred pounds.”

“I am glad you won; but who lost so much money?”

“Dunston dropped the greater part of it. Your American friend, Mr. Spencer, was rather inclined to brag of his prowess in that direction, it appears. He even went so far as to announce his willingness to play for four figures; but he backed out of it.”