Help reached us on the second day. We had been certain of rescue when we had sighted an airplane, at dawn, hundreds of feet above us. The search party consisted of true mountaineers and guides, rough fellows but likable. They had brought clothing, kit, and food for us, and were astonished, they admitted, that we were all in condition to make use of them. They had thought to find none of us alive.
They helped us down to the valley in easy stages, and it took us until the following day. We spent the night encamped on the north side of the great ridge of mountains that had seemed to us, beside the useless plane, so remote and so inaccessible. At daybreak we set forth again, a splendid clear day, and the whole of the valley below our camp lay plain to the eye. Eastward the mountain range ran sheer, and as far as I could judge impassable, to a snowcapped peak, or possibly two, that pierced the dazzling sky like the knuckles on a closed hand.
I said to the leader of the rescue expedition, just as we were starting out on the descent, "I used to climb much, in old days, when I was young. I don't know this country at all. Do many expeditions come this way?"
He shook his head. He told me conditions were difficult. He and his companions came from some distance away. The people in the valley to the eastward there were backward and ignorant; there were few facilities for tourists or for strangers. If I cared about climbing he could take me to other places, where I should find good sport. It was already rather late in the year, though, for expeditions.
I went on looking at that eastward ridge, remote and strangely beautiful.
"What do they call them," I said, "those twin peaks, to the east?"
He answered, "Monte Verita."
I knew then what had brought me back to Europe...
We parted, my fellow travelers and I, at a little town some twenty miles from the spot where the airplane had crashed. Transport took them onto the nearest railway line, and to civilization. I remained behind. I booked a room at the small hotel and deposited my luggage there. I bought myself strong boots, a pair of breeches, a jerkin, and a couple of shirts. Then I turned my back upon the town and climbed.
It was, as the guide had told me, late in the year for expeditions. Somehow I did not care. I was alone, and on the mountains once again. I had forgotten how healing solitude could be. The old strength came back to my legs and to my lungs, and the cold air bit into the whole of me. I could have shouted with delight, at fifty-five. Gone was the turmoil and the stress, the anxious stir of many millions; gone were the lights, and the vapid city smells. I had been mad to endure it for so long.
In a mood of exaltation I came to the valley that lies at the eastern foot of Monte Verita. It had not changed much, it seemed to me, from the description Victor gave of it, those many years ago before the war. The little town was small and primitive, the people dull and dour. There was a rough sort of inn--one could not grace it by the name of hotel--where I proposed to stay the night.
I was received with indifference, though not discourtesy. After supper I asked if the track was still passable to the summit of Monte Verita. My informant behind his bar--for bar and cafe were in one, and I ate there, being the only visitor--regarded me without interest as he drank the glass of wine I offered him.
"It is passable, I believe, as far as the village. Beyond that I do not know," he said.
"Is there much coming and going between your people in the valley here and those in the village on the mountain?" I asked.
"Sometimes. Perhaps. Not at this time of year," he answered.
"Do you ever have tourists here?"
"Few tourists. They go north. It is better in the north."
"Is there any place in the village where I could sleep tomorrow night?"
"I do not know."
I paused a moment, watching his heavy sullen face, then I said to him, "And the sacerdotesse, do they still live on the rock face on the summit of Monte Verita?"
He started. He turned his eyes full upon me, and leaned over the bar. "Who are you, then? What do you know of them?"
"Then they do exist still?" I said.
He watched me, suspicious. Much had happened to his country in the past twenty years, violence, revolution, hostility between father and son, and even this remote corner must have had its share. It may have been this that made reserve.
"There are stories," he said, slowly. "I prefer not to mix myself up in such matters. It is dangerous. One day there will be trouble."
"Trouble for whom?"
"For those in the village, for those who may live on Monte Verita--I know nothing of them--for us here in the valley. I do not know. If I do not know, no harm can come to me."
He finished his wine, and cleaned his glass, and wiped the bar with a cloth. He was anxious to be rid of me.
"At what time do you wish for your breakfast in the morning?" he said.
I told him seven, and went up to my room.
I opened the double windows and stood out on the narrow balcony. The little town was quiet. Few lights winked in the darkness. The night was clear and cold. The moon had risen and would be full tomorrow or the day after. It shone upon the dark mountain mass in front of me. I felt oddly moved, as though I had stepped back into the past. This room, where I should pass the night, might have been the same one where Victor and Anna slept, all those years ago, in the summer of 1913. Anna herself might have stood here, on the balcony, gazing up at Monte Verita, while Victor, unconscious of the tragedy so few hours distant, called to her from within.
And now, in their footsteps, I had come to Monte Verita.
The next morning I took my breakfast in the cafe-bar, and my landlord of the night before was absent. My coffee and bread were brought to me by a girl, perhaps his daughter. Her manner was quiet and courteous, and she wished me a pleasant day.
"I am going to climb," I said, "the weather seems set fair. Tell me, have you ever been to Monte Verita?"
Her eyes flickered away from mine instantly.
"No," she said, "no, I have never been away from the valley."
My manner was matter-of-fact, and casual. I said something about friends of mine having been here, some while ago--I did not say how long--and that they had climbed to the summit, and had found the rock face there, between the peaks, and had been much interested to learn about the sect who lived enclosed within the walls.
"Are they still there, do you know?" I asked, lighting a cigarette, elaborately at ease.
She glanced over her shoulder nervously, as though conscious that she might be overheard.
"It is said so," she answered. "My father does not discuss it before me. It is a forbidden subject to young people."
I went on smoking my cigarette.
"I live in America," I said, "and I find that there, as in most places, when the young people get together there is nothing they like discussing so well as forbidden subjects."
She smiled faintly but said nothing.
"I daresay you and your young friends often whisper together about what happens on Monte Verita," I said.
I felt slightly ashamed of my duplicity, but I felt that this method of attack was the most likely one to produce information.
"Yes," she said, "that is true. But we say nothing out loud. But just lately..." Once again she glanced over her shoulder, and then resumed, her voice pitched lower, "A girl I knew quite well, she was to marry shortly, she went away one day, she has not come back, and they are saying she has been called to Monte Verita."
"No one saw her go?"
"No. She went by night. She left no word, nothing."
"Could she not have gone somewhere quite different, to a large town, to one of the tourist centers?"
"It is believed not. Besides, just before, she had acted strangely. She had been heard talking in her sleep about Monte Verita."
I waited for a moment, then continued my inquiry, still nonchalant, still casual.
"What is the fascination in Monte Verita?" I asked. "The life there must be unbearably harsh, and even cr
uel?"
"Not to those who are called," she said, shaking her head. "They stay young always, they never grow old."
"If nobody has ever seen them, how can you know?"
"It has always been so. That is the belief. That is why here, in the valley, they are hated and feared, and also envied. They have the secret of life, on Monte Verita."
She looked out of the window towards the mountain. There was a wistful expression in her eyes.
"And you?" I said. "Do you think you will ever be called?"
"I am not worthy," she said. "Also, I am afraid."
She took away my coffee and offered me some fruit.
"And now," she said, her voice still lower, "since this last disappearance, there is likely to be trouble. The people are angry, here in the valley. Some of the men have climbed to the village and are trying to rouse them there, to get force of numbers, and then they will attack the rock. Our men will go wild. They will try to kill those who live there. Then there will be more trouble, we shall get the army here, there will be inquiries, punishments, shooting; it will all end badly. So it is not pleasant at the moment. Everyone goes about afraid. Everybody is whispering in secret."
A footstep outside sent her swiftly behind the bar. She busied herself there, her head low, as her father came into the room.
He glanced at both of us, suspiciously. I put out my cigarette and rose from the table.
"So you are still intent to climb?" he asked me.
"Yes," I said. "I shall be back in a day or two."
"It would be imprudent to stay there longer," he said.
"You mean the weather will break?"
"The weather will break, yes. Also, it might not be safe."
"In what way might it not be safe?"
"There may be disturbance. Things are unsettled just now. Men are out of temper. When they are out of temper, they lose their heads. And strangers, foreigners, can come to harm at such a time.
"It would be better if you gave up your idea of climbing Monte Verita and turned northwards. There is no trouble there."
"Thank you. But I have set my heart on climbing Monte Verita."
He shrugged his shoulders. He looked away from me.
"As you will," he said, "it is not my affair."
I walked out of the inn, down to the street, and crossing the little bridge above the mountain stream I set my face to the track through the valley that led me to the eastern face of Monte Verita.
At first the sounds from the valley were distinct. The barking of dogs, the tinkle of cow bells, the voices of men calling to one another, all these rose clearly to me in the still air. Then the blue smoke from the houses merged and became one misty haze, and the houses themselves took on a toy-town quality. The track wound above me and away, ever deeper into the heart of the mountain itself, until by midday the valley was lost in the depths and I had no other thought in my mind but to climb upwards, higher, always higher, win my way beyond that first ridge to the left, leave it behind me and gain the second, forget both in turn to achieve the third, steeper yet and overshadowed. My progress was slow, with untuned muscles and imperfect wind, but exhilaration of spirit kept me going and I was in no way tired, rather the reverse. I could have gone on forever.
It was with a shock of surprise that I came finally upon the village, for I had pictured it at least another hour away. I must have climbed at a great pace, for it was barely four o'clock. The village wore a forlorn, almost deserted appearance, and I judged that today there were few remaining inhabitants. Some of the dwellings were boarded up, others fallen in and partly destroyed. Smoke came only from two or three of them, and I saw no one working in the pastureland around. A few cows, lean-looking and unkempt, grazed by the side of the track, the jangling bells around their necks sounding hollow somehow in the still air. The place had a somber, depressing effect, after the stimulation of the climb. If this was where I must spend the night I did not think much of it.
I went to the door of the first dwelling that had a thin wisp of smoke coming from the roof and knocked upon the door. It was opened, after some time, by a lad of about fourteen, who after one look at me called over his shoulder to somebody within. A man of about my own age, stupid-looking and heavy, came to the door. He said something to me in patois, then staring a moment, and realizing his mistake, he broke, even more haltingly than I, into the language of the country.
"You are the doctor from the valley?" he said to me.
"No," I replied, "I am a stranger on vacation, climbing in the district. I want a bed for the night, if you can give me one."
His face fell. He did not reply directly to my request.
"We have someone here very sick," he said, "I do not know what to do. They said a doctor would come from the valley. You met no one?"
"I'm afraid not. No one climbed from the valley except myself. Who is ill? A child?"
The man shook his head. "No, no, we have no children here."
He went on looking at me, in a dazed, helpless sort of way, and I felt sorry for his trouble, but I did not see what I could do. I had no sort of medicines upon me but a first-aid packet and a small bottle of aspirin. The aspirin might be of use, if there was fever. I undid it from my pack and gave a handful to the man.
"These may help," I said, "if you care to try them."
He beckoned me inside. "Please to give them yourself," he said.
I had some reluctance to step within and be faced with the grim spectacle of a dying relative, but plain humanity told me I could hardly do otherwise. I followed him into the living room. There was a trestle bed against the wall and lying upon it, covered with two blankets, was a man, his eyes closed. He was pale and unshaven, and his features had that sharp pointed look about them that comes upon the face when near to death. I went close to the bed and gazed down upon him. He opened his eyes. For a moment we stared at one another, unbelieving. Then he put out his hand to me, and smiled. It was Victor...
"Thank God," he said.
I was too much moved to speak. I saw him beckon to the fellow, who stood apart, and speak to him in the patois, and he must have told him we were friends, for some sort of light broke in the man's face and he withdrew. I went on standing by the trestle bed, with Victor's hand in mine.
"How long have you been like this?" I asked at length.
"Nearly five days," he said. "Touch of pleurisy; I've had it before. Rather worse this time. I'm getting old."
Once again he smiled, and although I guessed him to be desperately ill, he was little changed, he was the same Victor still.
"You seem to have prospered," he said to me, still smiling, "you have all the sleek appearance of success."
I asked him why he had never written, and what he had been doing with himself for twenty years.
"I cut myself adrift," he said. "I gather you did the same, but in a different way. I haven't been back to England since I left. What is it that you're holding there?"
I showed him the bottle of aspirin.
"I'm afraid that's no use to you," I said. "The best thing I can suggest is for me to stay here tonight, and then first thing in the morning get the chap here, and one or two others, to help me carry you down to the valley."
He shook his head. "Waste of time," he said. "I'm done for. I know that."
"Nonsense. You need a doctor, proper nursing. That's impossible in this place." I looked around the primitive living room, dark and airless.
"Never mind about me," he said. "Someone else is more important."
"Who?"
"Anna," he said, and then as I answered nothing, at a loss for words, he added, "She's still here, you know, on Monte Verita."
"You mean," I said, "that she's in that place, enclosed, she's never left it?"
"That's why I'm here," said Victor. "I come every year, and have done, since the beginning. I wrote and told you, surely, after the war? I live in a little fishing port all the year round, very isolated and quiet, and then come here once in twelve mo
nths. I left it later this year, because I had been ill."
It was incredible. What an existence, all these years, without friends, without interests, enduring the long months until the time came for this hopeless annual pilgrimage.
"Have you ever seen her?" I asked.
"Never."
"Do you write to her?"
"I bring a letter every year. I take it up with me and leave it beneath the wall, and then return the following day."
"The letter gets taken?"
"Always. And in its place there is a slab of stone, with writing scrawled upon it. Never more than a few words. I take the stones away with me. I have them all down on the coast, where I live."
It was heart-rending, his faith in her, his fidelity through the years.
"I've tried to study it," he said, "this religion, belief. It's very ancient, way back before Christianity. There are old books that hint at it. I've picked them up from time to time, and I've spoken to people, scholars, who have made a study of mysticism and the old rites of ancient Gaul, and the Druids; there's a strong link between all mountain folk of those times. In every instance that I have read there is this insistence on the power of the moon and the belief that the followers stay young and beautiful."
"You talk, Victor, as if you believe that too," I said.
"I do," he answered. "The children believe it, here in the village, the few that remain."
Talking to me had tired him. He reached out for a pitcher of water that stood beside the bed.
"Look here," I said, "these aspirins can't hurt you, they can only help, if you have fever. And you might get some sleep."
I made him swallow three, and drew the blankets closer round him.
"Are there any women in the house?" I asked.
"No," he said, "I've been puzzled about that, since I've been here this time. The village is pretty much deserted. All the women and children have shifted to the valley. There are about twenty men and boys left, all told."
The Birds and Other Stories Page 10