“It will be awkward if this goes on,” Miss Jardine remarked.

“These thunderstorms seldom last,” said Helen.  “I expect we have seen the worst, and we must start again as soon as we can see.”

Festing thought she was anxious to get down, but Miss Jardine grumbled about the rain, and then turned to him.

“It was a relief to give you my sack, and I was glad to see it didn’t bother you.  I suppose you are used to these mountains.”

“No,” said Festing.  “This is the first time I’ve climbed a hill for amusement.”

“But you are a climber.  You have balance, trust your feet and not your hands, and know how to step on a loose stone.”

Festing laughed.  “I used to do something of the kind as a matter of business.  You see, I helped mark out the line for a new railroad in British Columbia, and rocks are plentiful in that country.”

“It must be a wonderful place,” said Helen.  “I have a photograph of the gorge at the foot of the glacier, where the line went through.  You had stern work when you laid the rails in winter.”

Festing looked at her in surprise, for he had worked to the edge of exhaustion and run many risks at the spot, but while he wondered how she knew Helen got up.

“I think the rain is stopping and we can start,” she said.

There was not much rain, but thick mist rolled across the top of the hill they were now level with, and everything below was blotted out.  Leaving the stones, they crossed a belt of boggy grass where their feet sank, but Festing felt it a relief to have done with the rocks.  The narrow tableland they were crossing was comfortingly flat, and he looked forward to descending a long grassy slope.  When they reached the edge, however, he got a rude disappointment, for the mist rolled up in waves with intervals between, and when a white cloud passed a gray light shone down into the gulf at his feet.

In the foreground there was a steep slope where rock ledges broke through the wet turf, and in one place a chasm cleft the hill.  He could not see the bottom, for it was filled with mist, but the height of the rock wall hinted at its depth.  A transverse ravine ran into the chasm, and he could hear the roar of a waterfall.  Then the mist rolled up in a white smother and blotted everything out.

“We cross the beck,” said Helen.  “Then we go nearly straight down, keeping this side of the big ghyll.”

“As far away as possible, I hope.  I don’t like its look,” Miss Jardine remarked.

Festing agreed with her.  So far as he could see, the descent looked forbidding, but there was no sign of the sky’s clearing, and it was obvious that they must get down.  The thunder had gone, but the mist brought a curious, searching damp, and a cold wind had begun to blow.  He was glad to think Helen knew the way.

She took them down a steep pitch where small rocky ledges dropped nearly vertical among patches of rotten turf and it was needful to get a good grip with one’s hands as well as with one’s feet.  Festing helped Miss Jardine when he could, but he had an unpleasant feeling that a rash step might take him over the edge of a precipice.  Sometimes he could see Helen in front, and sometimes, for a few moments, her figure was lost in the mist.  He was glad to note that she was apparently going down with confidence.