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Updated: June 4, 2025
To him as to her Walter Hine was a mere puppet, a thing without importance so long as he lived. But he must live. Dead, he threatened ruin and dishonor, and since from the beginning Sylvia and he had shared for so she would have it had shared in the effort to save this life, it would be well for them, he thought that they should not fail.
He alone apparently noticed no unsuitability in his guests. He sat at his ease, their bosom friend. Meanwhile, plied with champagne by Archie Parminter, who sat upon the other side of him, "Wallie" Hine began to boast. Sylvia tried to check him, but he was not now to be stopped.
"Do you mind if we bring in our cigars?" he asked. "Not at all," said she; and he came in, carrying in his hand a box of cigars, which he placed in the middle of the table. Wallie Hine at once stumbled across the room to Sylvia; he walked unsteadily, his features were more flushed than before. She shrank a little from him.
"I am old enough to hold my own against any man," he cried, hotly. He felt that Garratt Skinner had humiliated him, and before this wonderful daughter of his in whose good favors Mr. Hine had been making such inroads during supper. Barstow apologized for his suggestion at once, but Hine was now quite unwilling that he should withdraw it. "There's no harm in it," he cried.
We shall all die to-night. Why should a poor guide with a wife and family be tempted to ascend mountains. I will tell you something, monsieur," he cried suddenly across Walter Hine. "I am not fond of the mountains. No, I am not fond of them!" and he leaned back and fell asleep. "Better not follow his example, Wallie. Keep awake! Slap your limbs!"
As she stepped back over the threshold into the library where her father sat, she saw that he was holding a telegram in his hand. "Wallie Hine comes to-morrow, my dear," he said. Sylvia looked at her father wistfully. "It is a pity," she said, "a great pity. It would have been pleasant if we could have been alone."
He would sleep very likely in the hut on the Col, and go down the next morning to Courmayeur and make his arrangements for the Brenva climb. On the third day, to-day, he would set out with Walter Hine and sleep at the gîte on the rocks in the bay to the right of the great ice-fall of the Brenva glacier.
He was in the mind hotly to defend Captain Barstow from Mr. Jarvice's insinuations, but he refrained. "Then Barstow will know that I draw my allowance from you, and not from my grandfather," he stammered. There was the trouble for Walter Hine. If Barstow knew, Garratt Skinner would come to know. There would be an end to the deference and the flatteries.
Had Walter Hine toppled over, and swung down the length of the rope, as at any moment he might have done, Garratt Skinner was prepared. He would have jumped down the opposite side of the ice-arête, though how either he or Walter Hine could have regained the ridge he could not tell. Would any one of the party live to return to Courmayeur and tell the tale?
You shall hear from me," he said, and Walter Hine went out. Jarvice closed the door and turned back to his clerk. "That will do," he said. There was no client waiting at all. Mr. Jarvice had an ingenious contrivance for getting rid of his clients at the critical moment after they had come to a decision and before they had time to change their minds.
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