The Silent Valley

by Jean S. MacLeod

  The hut proved to be further away than she had at first imagined and appeared to be reached by a narrow ice bridge spanning a terrifyingly deep ravine, but the trail went over it and she knew that she must do the same. She closed her eyes for a sickly moment, willing herself to go on, and then she was crossing the bridge and digging her sticks into the soft snow on the far side.

  Laughing shakily, she reached the hut. It had windows on two sides and a stout pine door which was closed firmly against the rising wind. Madly she prayed that she might not find it empty.

  Her knock did not bring any response and she almost collapsed into the one room of the deserted hut. All the evidence of recent inhabitation which lay about on the rough wooden benches and tables was of little comfort to her. The ski-runners had eaten their meal and gone!

  She sat down at a table near the door, resting her head along her arm. Time seemed to be running out to some unescapable destiny, but for the present she could not care. Her aching body relaxed, the throbbing insistency of her thoughts was chilled.

  When she raised her head after many minutes she saw the wood ash in the stone fireplace. It still glowed faintly, like fire under snow, and she crossed to it, nursing it into a flame with some shavings from the woodpile in another corner. There was nothing to eat in the hut and she had no provisions with her.

  She walked about the hut, finding a tin of drinking chocolate and some salt in a cupboard behind the door and also a tin mug without a handle. In another corner there was a wooden keg containing spring water, and she wondered if she should try to make herself something hot to drink, heating the water in the mug over the now sparking logs.

  The quiet of the little hut was suddenly rent by the now familiar sound of falling ice and snow as another minor avalanche cascaded down into a ravine, and black despondency descended upon her as she saw herself isolated in the deserted hut for days. It was minutes before she realised that the hut would probably be the first place a search-party would aim for.

  With the comforting thought in mind, she built up the fire, but she was scarcely prepared for an immediate response to her smoke signal. A heavy tread approached the hut and her heart began to hammer painfully -as she crossed to the door.

  Through the narrow, inadequate window she saw the blurred figure of a man propping his skis against the side of the hut. His face was turned from her and there was no thought of recognition in her mind. That one blind second when Stuart's name had rushed to her lips had passed in senseless and unreasoning disappointment and she opened the door to the stranger.

  'Jane! Thank heaven I haven't been on a wild-goose chase!'

  Tom Sark stumbled across the threshold, brushing snow from his clothes and stamping it from his heavy boots, and Jane could almost have laughed at the caprice of fate. Tom in place of Stuart!

  'How did you get here? However did you come?' she gasped, relieved beyond measure to see someone she knew.

  'I followed what I hoped would be your ski tracks.' He took off his leather mittens and was rubbing his hands together for warmth. 'There was an awkward moment when I had to choose between right and left, but apparently I was lucky.'

  'I went wrong there, I think,' Jane said. 'I should have branched off the other way. At least, I feel that now.'

  'You came out after Della?' he suggested, watching her closely. 'Why?'

  'You shouldn't need to ask,' she told him quickly. 'She's still in no fit state to go out with a party on a whole day's run.'

  'But she is with a party,' he pointed out. 'Jane, what a fool you've been, risking this sort of thing under such conditions and alone!'

  'I had to find her,' Jane said desperately, realising her own predicament perhaps for the first time. 'I had to try to dissuade her from going on, and now I've made the most hopeless mess of everything!'

  He did not try to contradict her. His eyes were on the scudding clouds which they could see through the tiny window and his own optimism was not particularly high.

  'The idea being, I suppose, that you might reach Della before she had gone very far and persuade her to return with you ? It was a hare-brained scheme, Jane, whichever way you like to look at it.'

  'I know—I know that now!' Jane realised that her first consideration had been the promise she had made to Stuart, but it was no use telling Tom about that. He just wouldn't understand. 'All I can hope for is that Della and some other member of the ski party made the ski trail to the clinic.'

  'If that's where it went it might be the answer,' he mused. 'It would solve Della's problem, of course, but it is hardly likely to solve ours.' He crossed to the karte on the wall. 'As far as I can see, we're practically marooned up here.'

  'But the snow isn't really heavy,' Jane protested. 'We can go down by the way we came, over the bridge and back along the trail to the road, if necessary.'

  'Janey,' he said, as if he were explaining something to a child, 'we can't go back by the way we came. The ice bridge isn't there any more. I just got over it in time. It split and went down into the ravine with a sound like a thunder.'

  Jane remembered the rumbling which she had taken for a distant avalanche, but she still continued to stare at him incredulously.

  'There must be some other way,' she said. 'We must get back to Oberzach tonight.'

  He frowned, and then he laughed almost lightly.

  'I can't think of one short of flying! Can you?'

  She was forced to confess her own inadequacy, for she knew so little of this white countryside and its peculiar hazards.

  'It's no use saying I wish I had never come,' she observed miserably. 'I do wish it, but that won't get us very far. What can we do, Tom? Can't you think? Can't you suggest anything?'

  The fine edge of hysteria in her voice was apparent to him in the instant, and he said quietly:

  'I'm as green as you are about mountaineering, but the fact remains that we are not miles from civilisation. We're not very high up, either, and we're provided with adequate shelter. The people at Oberzach know where we were going, and even if the snowfall does obliterate our trail, they're sure to try the hut, soon or later.'

  'You came from Oberzach, of course.' Jane looked at him curiously. 'How did you know about—this?'

  'By the simple expedient of calling at Doktor Frey's after I had signed in at the hotel.' His calm acceptance of their predicament was helping to steady her and he went on quickly. 'The doctor's sister was not at home, but I gathered from a rather frenzied servant that you should never have set out in pursuit of Miss Cortonwell alone. Knowing what I do now, I'm entirely in agreement with the fair Swiss miss!'

  'You make it all sound—more than foolish,' Jane told him ruefully. 'Before you came I was quite convinced I could get back to the valley and perhaps reach the clinic by the road, but now that's impossible.' She turned to face him, her eyes dark-shadowed with distress. 'What are we to do?'

  'Wait patiently till we're picked up.' He came towards her, putting a comforting arm about her slim shoulders. 'This sort of thing has happened before, you know,' he pointed out lightly. 'We are not the first couple to be stranded by an unexpected fall of snow, so take heart. It would be absolute madness to attempt to go down when we know so little about conditions round here.'

  'We might be here overnight—even for days!'

  Jane saw the hours passing, lengthening into days, with Stuart returning to Oberzach at the end of them to be witness to the climax of her absurd adventure.

  'Highly improper of us!' Tom grinned. 'But excusable.

  Even Sir Walter Raleigh's famous cloak wouldn't be much use for crossing the ravine!'

  'It's easier for you,' Jane said, biting her lip. 'You have no responsibilities. You're out here on holiday.'

  He swung round to confront her almost angrily.

  'Look here, Jane,' he said, 'stop blaming yourself for everything! Della Cortonwell is old enough to know when she's being a fool, and even Hemmingway couldn't hold you entirely responsible for her mad schemes. You've
got to believe that Della would have found some other way of exerting her ego if it hadn't been this.'

  'You don't understand,' Jane protested. 'I should have known it was coming. Stuart saw it and warned me ‑'

  'And put you on your honour not to let his precious fiancée out of your sight? They are engaged, I suppose?'

  'Not officially.' The remaining colour fled from Jane's cheeks. 'Della's in love with him, of course,' she added flatly.

  'And he with her?' There was something watchful in Tom's brief glance at her distressed face.

  'I suppose so. This cure he is hoping for will mean a great deal to him.'

  'But he wouldn't marry her as things stand? Well, it could scarcely be expected, could it, even to please Sir Gervaise and further his own career?' The thin edge of sarcasm in Tom's voice deepened. He did not like Sir Gervaise and he was envious of Stuart. 'Cortonwell's the sort of man who would go out of his way to marry his daughter off to someone important, and if he thinks he has any hold on Hemmingway he'll use it without much compunction. He's as ruthless as hell. I've come up against him, and I know.'

  'The registrar's job?' Jane asked sympathetically.

  'He kicked my application out,' Tom admitted disgustedly. 'It would have been a job after my own heart, but he had someone else earmarked for it, I expect, someone who could do him a bit of good 1 He's the sort who would cheerfully disinherit his own flesh and blood if it would benefit himself in any way.'

  The amazingly bitter remark struck Jane as being very unlike Tom, but perhaps he was disappointed about the registrar's job. There was no accounting for a man's secret ambitions and she felt glad that he appeared to have ambitions after all.

  'I was going to make some cocoa,' she said. 'There's half a tin full in the cupboard and a mug and some water.'

  'And I've got two slabs of chocolate and an orange!' He turned from the fire to grin at her. 'We couldn't have done better if we had landed on a desert island!'

  'At least, it would have been warm!' Jane shivered.

  He put his arm about her again, still protectively.

  'Come on, then!' he encouraged. 'We'll make the cocoa. I've always loathed the stuff, but it's amazing what you can drink if you try!'

  They crouched before the fire, taking it in turn to hold the mug over the flames with a pair of wrought-iron tongs which might have been left there for the purpose, while outside the snow fell in a thickening blanket of white, obscuring the mountain wall across the narrow ravine and the broken ice bridge and the valley far beneath.

  When Jane heard footsteps for the second time, and men's voices, she could scarcely believe it.

  'Tom!' she cried. 'Tom!' and stumbled to the door.

  It swung open before she could reach it and Stuart stood there in the grey half-light, tall and dominating, with the curtain of falling snow behind him and the light relief in his grey eyes.

  'Jane!' he said. 'Thank God I've found you!'

  Her heart bounded and every pulse in her body began to leap madly. Whenever he came it was the same. Her eyes clung to his for a long, breathless moment, searching, rewarded, and then his gaze went beyond her into the hut and he saw the man standing in the shadows beside the fire. He drew back as if something had leapt out and scorched him, and his face seemed cast in granite when he said:

  'I had no idea you had a companion. I understood that you went out after Della, but apparently I've been misinformed.'

  Jane found herself struggling for words.

  'I did go after Della. Tom and I followed the wrong trail.'

  He did not appear to be listening. His hard, expressionless gaze was taking in the scene in the hut and Tom's efforts at making her comfortable. The cheerfully-burning fire, the cocoa still steaming in the tin mug and Tom's resentful glare all might have suggested that they were not too greatly concerned about Della or her whereabouts.

  Two men had come to the door behind him, villagers whom Jane had seen once or twice and remembered. They looked relieved that their search had ended so quickly.

  'We'll push off right away,' Stuart decided, taking command. After that first brief glance he did not seem to notice Tom. 'We came up by a rather difficult route when we discovered that the ice bridge had given way,' he explained. 'We saw the smoke from your fire, of course, and realised that you must be up here.'

  Jane felt that there was nothing more to say. He had reached his own conclusions, and she felt too weak and mentally bruised to argue. When she struggled with the hood of her windcheater it was Tom who came to fasten it for her.

  'Cheer up, Jane!' he urged. 'Our fate is no longer in the lap of the gods—at least, not quite the same gods!'

  She was in no mood to meet Tom's flippancy, and Stuart was waiting for them to start. He had damped down the fire and given a last cursory glance round the hut to see that everything was in order.

  'We'll have to report the bridge,' he said to one of the Swiss guides. 'This was completely unforeseen.'

  Their way back skirted the edge of the glacier and he organised the convoy, roping Jane and himself together for further safety. Tom he sent on ahead between the two guides. They could not see the ice for the newly-fallen snow, but the chill of it smote deeply, finding Jane's heart. It seemed as if the end of the world had come.

  Led by the two guides, they reached the valley in what seemed an incredibly short space of time, and Stuart said abruptly:

  'The guides are going on to the hotel. Will you make sure that they get something to drink and a hot meal?'

  It was the first time he had addressed a direct remark to Tom, and Jane saw Tom smile as he answered:

  'I can look after that part of it. Thanks for all you've done for us, Hemmingway. It was an unfortunate accident, but I'm afraid these things just can't be helped, however efficient we may be otherwise.'

  Stuart turned to where Doktor Frey and Hilde were waiting for them in the shelter of the stone porch.

  'In future I wouldn't take risks, if I were you,' he said stiffly. 'Oberzach isn't exactly as safe as Arosa.'

  'We knew that Stuart would find you and bring you safely back!' Hilde cried, embracing Jane with frank relief in her blue eyes. 'It has all been so difficult, explaining to him, when he shot off like someone who has gone out of his senses after we tell him that you are lost!'

  Jane turned into the ski-room and Stuart came in behind her, hanging his sticks up on the rack. He had stiffened at Hilde's remark, but he made no reference to it as Jane tried to unbuckle her skis.

  'What happened to Della?' she asked.

  'She's up at the clinic.' He bent down to undo the frozen binding for her, his dark head bowed to the task, his face hidden. 'The effort proved her wrong even more forcibly than I could have done,' he added grimly. 'If she escapes pneumonia she'll be lucky.'

  'Please don't blame her too much,' Jane begged. 'Being Della, she just couldn't stand aside and see them go when she felt so fit.'

  'Being Della, she took the law completely into her own hands and hoodwinked you into the bargain,' he said calmly. 'This outside treatment has proved nothing but a farce, and I dare say I should have expected it.'

  'Perhaps if you had someone you could have trusted,' she began bitterly.

  He stood her skis side by side with his own against the wall, and they looked small and childish by comparison.

  'Recrimination never did anyone any good,' he said. 'What you need now is a hot meal and a good night's rest.'

  'Will you leave Della at the clinic?'

  'For the present.'

  His decision was inflexible, stamped inexorably in the set of his jaw and the hard line of his handsome mouth, and Jane could find no pity in him, for Della or anyone else. Why he had returned from Geneva two days earlier than he had intended did not matter. He had come and found her wanting, and he was making no secret of his anger.

  Throughout the meal he listened to her description of the events of the day in stony silence, leaving it to the doctor and Hilde to comme
nt on her adventure, and when their coffee was served he rose after gulping down a solitary cup.

  'I'll get back up to the clinic,' he said to his host. 'Shall I see you up there later, or would you like me to do your rounds for you and save you the journey?'

  Albert Frey shook his head.

  'I'll come with you. I'd like to hear about your visit to Geneva, Stuart, and I obtained some information in Zurich today which I think will interest you. It may even have an indirect bearing on Miss Cortonwell's case.'

  Instantly Stuart's whole manner changed. He was alert, thoughtful, and most of the angry resentment seemed to have evaporated.

  'Do you mean the new Loti theory?' he asked as he stood waiting, for the doctor to find his coat. 'I wondered when they would issue their results. You mean to try them out at the clinic, then?'

  Albert Frey nodded.

  'They are certainly worth a trial,' he said.

  Stuart turned to Hilde.

  'I may stay up at the chalets for a few days,' he said. 'It might be necessary, if there are complications. Don't worry about me. I'll manage all right.'

  He had not looked at Jane, and she felt dismissed. He was going to be near Della, to give her the extra confidence of his love, hopeless though it might prove to be.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  There was no doubt that Tom Sark could make himself very agreeable, especially to people who he thought might be able to help him. He had come to Switzerland for three weeks, on holiday, but there was just the possibility that he might be able to prolong his visit. Specialised knowledge of an insidious disease could scarcely be acquired in a day or two, but he could still pick up quite a lot of useful knowledge by impressing Doktor Frey with his keenness. His disappointment over the registrar's job in Norchester had gone deep, and there was no very pressing reason why he should return immediately. It would be something of a feather in his cap, besides, to go back as an ex-pupil of the renowned Doktor Albert Frey.