XXV
ON THE _MER DE GLACE_
"Well, we can't all get into one carriage," said Polly, on the littlebrick-paved veranda of the hotel, "so what is the use of fussing,Adela?"
"I don't care," said Adela, "I'm going to ride in the same carriagewith you, Polly Pepper, so there!" and she ran her arm in Polly's, andheld it fast.
Jasper kicked his heel impatiently against one of the pillars where thesweetbrier ran; then he remembered, and stopped suddenly, hoping nobodyhad heard. "The best way to fix it is to go where we are put," he saidat last, trying to speak pleasantly.
"No, I'm going with Polly," declared Adela, perversely, holding Pollytighter than ever.
"I'm going with you, Polly," cried Phronsie, running up gleefully,"Grandpapa says I may."
"Well, so am I," announced Adela, loudly.
Tom Selwyn gave a low whistle, and thrust his hands in his pockets, hisgreat and only comfort on times like these.
"Anything but a greedy girl," he sniffed in lofty contempt.
Meanwhile the horses were being put in the carriages, the stable menwere running hither and thither to look to buckle and strap, and a lotof bustle was going on that at any other time would have claimed theboys. Now it fell flat, as a matter of interest.
"Halloo--k-lup!" The drivers gave the queer call clear down in theirthroats, and hopped to their places on the three conveyances, and witha rattle and a flourish the horses now spun around the fountain in thelittle courtyard to come up with a swing to the veranda.
"Now, then," said Grandpapa, who had been overseeing every detail,"here we are," running his eyes over his party; "that's right," ingreat satisfaction. "I never saw such a family as I have for beingprompt on all occasions. Well then, the first thing I have to do is toget you settled in these carriages the right way."
Adela, at that, snuggled up closer than ever to Polly, and gripped herfast.
"Now, Mrs. Fisher," said old Mr. King, "you'll ride with Mrs. Selwyn inthe first carriage, and you must take two of the young folks in withyou."
"Oh, let Polly and me go in there!" cried Adela, forgetting herwholesome fear of the stately old gentleman in her anxiety to get herown way.
"Polly is going with me and Phronsie," said Mr. King. "Hop in, Adela,child, and one of you boys."
Tom ducked off the veranda, while Adela, not daring to say anothersyllable, slowly withdrew her arm from Polly's and mounted the carriagestep, with a miserable face.
"Come on, one of you boys," cried Mr. King, impatiently. "We shouldhave started a quarter of an hour ago--I don't care which one, onlyhurry."
"I can't!" declared Tom, flatly, grinding his heel into the pebbles,and looking into Jasper's face.
"Very well,"--Jasper drew a long breath,--"I must, then." And withoutmore ado, he got into the first carriage and they rattled off to waitoutside the big gate till the procession was ready to start.
Old Mrs. Gray, the parson's wife and the parson, and little Dr. Fishermade the next load, and then Grandpapa, perfectly delighted that he hadarranged it all so nicely, with Polly and Phronsie, climbed into thethird and last carriage, while Tom swung himself up as a fourth.
"They say it is a difficult thing to arrange carriage parties withsuccess," observed Mr. King. "I don't find it so in the least," headded, complacently, just on the point of telling the driver to givethe horses their heads. "But that is because I've such a fine party onmy hands, where each one is willing to oblige, and--"
"Ugh!" exclaimed Tom Selwyn, with a snort that made the old gentlemanstart. "I'm going to get out a minute--excuse me--can't explain." Andhe vaulted over the wheel.
"Bless me, what's come to the boy!" exclaimed Mr. King; "now he'sforgotten something. I hope he won't be long."
But Tom didn't go into the hotel. Instead, he dashed up to carriagenumber one. "Get out," he was saying to Jasper, and presenting a veryred face to view. "I'm going in here."
"Oh, no," said Jasper; "it's all fixed, and I'm going to stay here."And despite all Tom could say, this was the sole reply he got. So backhe went, and climbed into old Mr. King's carriage again, with a veryrueful face.
Old Mr. King viewed him with cold displeasure as the driver smacked hiswhip and off they went to join the rest of the party.
"You must go first," sang out the little doctor, as Grandpapa'scarriage drove up; "you are the leader, and we'll all follow you."
"Yes, yes," shouted the parson, like a boy.
And the occupants of carriage number one saying the same thing,Grandpapa's conveyance bowled ahead; and he, well pleased to head theprocession, felt some of his displeasure at the boy sitting opposite tohim dropping off with each revolution of the wheels.
But Tom couldn't keep still. "I didn't want to come in this carriage,sir!" he burst out.
"Eh! what?" Old Mr. King brought his gaze again to bear upon Tom's face.
"Well, you are here now," he said, only half comprehending.
"Because Jasper won't take the place," cried Tom, setting his teethtogether in distress. "That's what I got out for."
"Oh, I see," said Mr. King, a light beginning to break through.
Tom wilted miserably under the gaze that still seemed to go through andthrough him, and Polly looked off at her side of the carriage, wishingthe drive over the _Tete Noire_ was all ended. Old Mr. King turned toPhronsie at his side.
"Well, now," he said, taking her hand, "we are in a predicament,Phronsie, for it evidently isn't going to be such an overwhelmingsuccess as I thought."
"What is a predicament?" asked Phronsie, wrenching her gaze from thelovely vine-clad hills, which she had been viewing with greatsatisfaction, to look at once into his face.
"Oh, a mix-up; a mess generally," answered Grandpapa, not pausing tochoose words. "Well, what's to be done, now,--that is the question?"
Tom groaned at sight of the face under the white hair, from which allprospect of pleasure had fled. "I was a beastly cad," he muttered tohimself.
Phronsie leaned over Mr. King's knee. "Tell me," she begged, "what isit, Grandpapa?"
"Oh, nothing, child," said Grandpapa, with a glance at Polly's face,"that you can help, at least."
Polly drew a long breath. "Something must be done," she decided. "Oh, Iknow. Why, Grandpapa, we can change before we get to the halfwayplace," she cried suddenly, glad to think of something to say. "Can'twe? And then we can all have different places."
"The very thing!" exclaimed Mr. King, his countenance lightening."Come, Tom, my boy, cheer up. I'll put Jasper and every one else in theright place soon. Here you, stop a bit, will you?"--to the driver.
"K-lup!" cried the driver, thinking it a call to increase speed; so thehorses bounded on smartly for several paces, and no one could speak toadvantage.
"Make him hold up, Tom!" commanded Mr. King, sharply. And Tom knowingquite well how to accomplish this, Grandpapa soon stood up in thecarriage and announced, "In half an hour, or thereabout, if we come toa good stopping-place, I shall change some of you twelve people aboutin the carriages. Pass the word along."
But Adela didn't ride with Polly. For rushing and pushing as the changeabout was effected, to get her way and be with Polly, she felt her armtaken in a very light but firm grasp.
"No, no, my dear,"--it was old Mr. King,--"not that way. Here is yourplace. When a little girl pushes, she doesn't get as much as if shewaits to be asked."
"It had to be done," he said to himself, "for the poor child has had nomother to teach her, and it will do her good." But he felt sorry forhimself to be the one to teach the lesson. And so they went over the_Tete Noire_ to catch the first sight of Mont Blanc.
* * * * *
"I'm going to have a donkey for my very own," confided Phronsie,excitedly, the next morning, to Jasper, whom she met in the littlesun-parlour.
"No!" cried Jasper, pretending to be much amazed, "you don't say so,Phronsie!"
"Yes, I am," she cried, bobbing her yellow head. "Grandpapa said so; hereally
did, Jasper. And I'm going to ride up that long, big mountain onmy donkey." She pointed up and off, but in the wrong direction.
"Oh, no, Phronsie, that isn't the way we are going. The Montanvert isover here, child," corrected Jasper.
"And I'm going to ride my donkey," repeated Phronsie, caring littlewhich way she was going, since all roads must of course lead tofairy-land, "and we're going to see the water that's frozen, andGrandpapa says we are to walk over it; but I'd rather ride my donkey,Jasper," confided Phronsie, in a burst of confidence.
"I guess you'll be glad enough to get off from your donkey by the timeyou reach the top of Montanvert," observed Jasper, wisely.
"Well, now, Phronsie, we are not going for a day or two, you know, forfather doesn't wish us to be tired."
"I'm not a bit tired, Jasper," said Phronsie, "and I do so very muchwish we could go to-day."
"O dear me!" exclaimed Jasper, with a little laugh, "why, we've onlyjust come, Phronsie! It won't be so very long before we'll be off.Goodness! the time flies so here, it seems to me we sha'n't hardly turnaround before those donkeys will be coming into this yard after us toget on their backs."
But Phronsie thought the time had never dragged so in all her smalllife; and, although she went about hanging to Grandpapa's hand as sweetand patient as ever, all her mind was on the donkeys; and whenever shesaw one,--and the street was full, especially at morning and in thelate afternoon, of the little beasts of burden, clattering up the stonyroads,--she would beg to just go and pat one of the noses, if by chanceone of the beasts should stand still long enough to admit of suchattention.
"Oh, no, Phronsie," expostulated old Mr. King, when this pleasinglittle performance had been indulged in for a half a dozen times. "Youcan't pat them all; goodness me, child, the woods are full of them," hebrought up in dismay.
"Do they live in the woods?" asked Phronsie, in astonishment.
"I mean, the place--this whole valley of Chamonix is full of donkeys,"said Grandpapa, "so you see, child, it's next to impossible to pat alltheir noses."
"I hope I'm going to have that dear, sweet little one," cried Phronsie,giving up all her mind, since the soft noses couldn't be patted, tohappy thoughts of to-morrow's bliss. "See, Grandpapa," she pulled hishand gently, "to ride up the mountain on."
"Well, you'll have a good one, that is, as good as can be obtained,"said the old gentleman; "but as for any particular one, why, they'reall alike to me as two peas, Phronsie."
But Phronsie had her own ideas on the subject, and though on everyother occasion agreeing with Grandpapa, she saw good and sufficientreason why every donkey should be entirely different from every otherdonkey. And when, on the next morning, their procession of donkeysfiled solemnly into the hotel yard, she screamed out, "Oh, Grandpapa,here he is, the very one I wanted! Oh, may I have him? Put me up, do!"
"He's the worst one of the whole lot," groaned Grandpapa, his eyerunning over the file, "I know by the way he puts his vicious old feetdown. Phronsie, here is a cunning little fellow," he added, artfullytrying to lead her to one a few degrees better, he fondly hoped. ButPhronsie already had her arms up by her particular donkey's neck, andher cheek laid against his nose, and she was telling him that he washer donkey, for she thought Grandpapa would say "Yes." So what elsecould he do, pray tell, but say "Yes"? And she mounted the steps, andwas seated, her little brown gown pulled out straight, and the saddlegirth tightened, and all the other delightful and important detailsattended to, and then the reins were put in her overjoyed hands.
She never knew how it was all done, seeing nothing, hearing nothing ofthe confusion and chatter, of the mounting of the others, her gazefixed on the long ears before her, and only conscious that her very owndonkey was really there, and that she was on his back. And it was notuntil they started and the guide who held her bridle loped off into aneasy pace, by the animal's head, that she aroused from her dream ofbliss as a sudden thought struck her. "What is my donkey's name?" sheasked softly.
The man loped on, not hearing, and he wouldn't have understood had heheard.
"I don't believe he has any name," said old Mr. King just behind."Phronsie, is your saddle all right? Do you like it, child?" all in onebreath.
"I like it very much," answered Phronsie, trying to turn around.
"Don't do that, child," said Grandpapa, hastily. "Sit perfectly still,and on no account turn around or move in the saddle."
"I won't, Grandpapa," she promised, obediently, and presently she beganagain, "I want to know his name, Grandpapa, so that I can tell my ponywhen I get home."
"Oh, well, we'll find out," said Grandpapa. "Here you, can't you tellthe name of that donkey?" he cried to the guide holding Phronsie'sbridle. "Oh, I forgot, he doesn't understand English," and he tried itin French.
But this was not much better, for old Mr. King, preferring to use nonebut the best of French when he employed any, was only succeeding inmystifying the poor man so that he couldn't find his tongue at all, butstared like a clod till the old gentleman's patience was exhausted.
At last Jasper, hearing what the trouble was, shouted out somethingfrom his position in the rear, that carried the meaning along with it,and Phronsie the next minute was delighted to hear "Boolah," as theguide turned and smiled and showed all his teeth at her, his pleasurewas so great at discovering that he could really understand.
"Why, that's the name of my donkey," said Polly, patting the beast'srough neck. "He told me so when he helped me to mount."
"So it is mine," announced Jasper, bursting into a laugh. "I guess theyonly have one name for the whole lot."
"Well, don't let us tell Phronsie so," said Polly, "and I shall callmine 'Greybeard' because he's got such a funny old stiff beard and itis grey."
"And I shall christen mine 'Boneyard,'" declared Jasper, "for he's gotsuch a very big lot of bones, and they aren't funny, I can tell you."
And so with fun and nonsense and laughter, as soon as they wound aroundby the little English church and across the meadows, and struck intothe pine wood, the whole party of twelve, Grandpapa and all, began tosing snatches from the newest operas down to college songs. ForGrandpapa hadn't forgotten his college days when he had sung with thebest, and he had the parson on this occasion to keep him company, andthe young people, of course, knew all the songs by heart, as what youngperson doesn't, pray tell! So the bits and snatches rolled out with agusto, and seemed to echo along the whole mountain side as theprocession of sure-footed animals climbed the steep curves.
"Oh, Polly, your donkey is going over," exclaimed Adela, who rode thesecond in the rear after Polly; "he flirts his hind legs right over theprecipice every time you go round a curve."
"Well, he brings them round all right," said Polly, composedly; and,with a little laugh, "Oh, isn't this too lovely for anything!" shecried, with sparkling eyes.
"Well, don't let him," cried Adela, huddling up on her donkey, andpulling at the rein to make him creep closer to the protecting earthwall.
"Na--na," one of the guides ran up to her, shaking his head. Adela,fresh from her Paris school had all her French, of the best kind too,at her tongue's end, but she seemed to get on no better than Mr. King.
"My French is just bad enough to be useful," laughed Jasper. So heuntangled the trouble again, and made Adela see that she really mustnot pull at her bridle, but allow the donkey to go his own gait, forthey were all trained to it.
"Your French is just beautiful," cried Polly. "Oh, Jasper, you knowMonsieur always says--"
"Don't, Polly," begged Jasper, in great distress.
"No, I won't," promised Polly, "and I didn't mean to. But I couldn'thelp it, Jasper, when you spoke against your beautiful French."
"We've all heard you talk French, Jasper, so you needn't feel so cut upif Polly should quote your Monsieur," cried Tom, who, strange to say,no matter how far he chanced to ride in the rear, always managed tohear everything.
"That's because we are everlastingly turning a corner," he explained,when they twit
ted him for it, "and as I'm near the end of the line Iget the benefit of the doubling and twisting, for the front is alwaysjust above me. So don't say anything you don't want me to hear, oldfellow," he sang out to Jasper on the bridle path "just above," as Tomhad said.
"Now, don't you want to get off?" cried Jasper, deserting his donkey,and running up to Phronsie, as they reached the summit and drew upbefore the hotel.
"Oh, somebody take that child off," groaned old Mr. King, accepting thearm of the guide to help him dismount, "for I can't. Every separate anddistinct bone in my body protests against donkeys from this time forthand forevermore. And yet I've got to go down on one," he added ruefully.
"No, I don't want to get down," declared Phronsie, still holding fastto the reins; "can't I sit on my donkey, Jasper, while you all walkover on the frozen water?"
"Oh, my goodness, no!" gasped Jasper. "Why, Phronsie, you'd be tired todeath--the very idea, child!"
"No," said Phronsie, shaking her yellow hair obstinately, "I wouldn'tbe tired one single bit, Jasper. And I don't want to get down from mydonkey."
"Well, if you didn't go over the _Mer de Glace_, why, we couldn't anyof us go," said Jasper, at his wits' end how to manage it withoutworrying his father, already extremely tired, he could see, "and that'swhat we've come up for--"
Phronsie dropped the reins. "Take me down, please, Jasper," she said,putting out her arms.
"How are you now, father?" cried Jasper, running over to him when hehad set Phronsie on the ground.
"It's astonishing," said old Mr. King, stretching his shapely limbs,"but all that dreadful sensation I always have after riding on one ofthose atrocious animals is disappearing fast."
"That's good," cried Jasper, in delight. "Well, I suppose we are allgoing to wait a bit?" he asked, and longing to begin the tramp over the_Mer de Glace_.
"Wait? Yes, indeed, every blessed one of us," declared his father."Goodness me, Jasper, what are you thinking of to ask such a question,after this pull up here? Why, we sha'n't stir from this place for anhour."
"I supposed we'd have to wait," said Jasper, rushing off over therocks, feeling how good it was to get down on one's feet again, and runand race. And getting Polly and Tom and Adela, they ran down where thedonkeys were tethered and saw them fed, and did a lot of exploring; andit didn't seem any time before an Alpine horn sounded above theirheads, and there was Grandpapa, tooting away and calling them to comeup and buy their woollen socks; for they were going to start.
So they scrambled up, and picked out their socks, and, each seizing apair in one hand and an alpenstock with a long, sharp spike on the endin the other, they ran off down the zigzag path to the glacier, two orthree guides helping the others along. At the foot of the rocky paththe four drew up.
"O dear, it's time to put on these horrible old stockings," grumbledAdela, shaking hers discontentedly.
"'Good old stockings,' you'd much better say," broke in Jasper.
"They're better than a broken neck," observed Tom, just meaning to askPolly if he could put hers on for her. But he was too slow in gettingat it, and Jasper was already kneeling on the rocks and doing that verything.
"Now I'm all ready," announced Polly, stamping her feet, arrayed inmarvellous red-and-white striped affairs. "Thank you, Jasper. Oh, howfunny they feel!"
"Shall I help you?" asked Tom, awkwardly enough, of Adela.
"Oh, I don't want them on, and I don't mean to wear them," said Adela,with a sudden twist. "I'm going to throw them away."
"Then you'll just have to stay back," said Jasper, decidedly, "for noone is to be allowed on that glacier who doesn't put on a pair."
"I won't slip--the idea!" grumbled Adela. Yet she stuck out her foot,and Tom, getting down on his knees, suppressed a whistle as he securelytied them on. Then the boys flew into theirs instanter.
"Mine are blue," said Phronsie, as the others filed slowly down thewinding path between the rocks, and she pointed to the pair danglingacross her arm. "I am so very glad they are blue, Grandpapa."
"So am I, Pet," he cried, delighted to find that he was apparently asagile as the parson. No one could hope to equal little Dr. Fisher, whowas here, there, and everywhere, skipping about among the rocks like aboy let loose from school.
"Well, well, the children are all ready," exclaimed old Mr. King,coming upon the four, impatient to begin their icy walk.
"Didn't you expect it?" cried little Dr. Fisher, skipping up.
"Well, to say the truth, I did," answered old Mr. King, with a laugh."Now, Phronsie, sit down on that rock, and let the guide tie on yourstockings." So Phronsie's little blue stockings were tied on, and afterGrandpapa had gallantly seen that everybody else was served, he had hispulled on over his boots and fastened securely, and the line of marchwas taken up.
"You go ahead, father," begged Jasper, "and we'll all follow."
So old Mr. King, with Phronsie and a guide on her farther side, led theway, and the red stockings and the brown and the black, and some ofindescribable hue, moved off upon the _Mer de Glace_.
"It's dreadfully dirty," said Adela, turning up her nose. "I thought aglacier was white when you got up to it."
"Oh, I think it is lovely!" cried Polly; "and that green down in thecrevasse--look, Adela!"
"It's a dirty green," persisted Adela, whose artistic sense wouldn't besatisfied. "O dear me!" as her foot slipped and she clutched Mrs.Henderson, who happened to be next.
"Now, how about the woollen stockings?" asked Tom, while Polly andJasper both sang out, "Take care," and "Go slowly."
Adela didn't answer, but stuck the sharp end of her alpenstock smartlyinto the ice.
"Something is the matter with my stocking," at last said the parson'swife, stopping and holding out her right foot.
The guide nearest her stopped, too, and kneeling down on the ice, hepulled it into place, for it had slipped half off.
"Now be very careful," warned Grandpapa, "and don't venture too nearthe edge," as he paused with Phronsie and the guide. The others, comingup, looked down into a round, green pool of water that seemed to stareup at them, as if to say, "I am of unknown depth, so beware of me."
"That gives me the 'creeps,' Polly, as you say," Mrs. Hendersonobserved. "Dear me, I shall never forget how that green water looks;"and she shivered and edged off farther yet. "Supposing any one _should_fall in!"
"Well, he'd go down right straight through the globe, seems to me,"said Tom, with a last look at the pool as they turned off, "It looks asif it had no end, till one would fetch up on the other side."
"I love to hop over these little crevasses," said Polly, and suitingthe action to the word.
"Something is the matter with my stocking again," announced Mrs.Henderson to the guide, presently. "I am sorry to trouble you, but itneeds to be fixed."
He didn't understand the words, but there was no mistaking the footthrust out with the woollen sock, now wet and sodden, half off again.So he kneeled down and pulled it on once more.
Before they reached the other side, the parson's wife had had thatstocking pulled on six times, until at last, the guide, finding no morepleasure in a repetition of the performance, took a string from hispocket, and bunching up in his fist a good portion of the stockingheel, he wound the string around it and tied it fast, cut off thestring, and returned the rest to his pocket.
"Why do you tie up the heel?" queried Mrs. Henderson. "I should thinkit much better to secure it in front." But he didn't understand, andthe rest were quite a good bit in advance, and hating to give trouble,she went on, the stocking heel sticking out a few inches. But she keptit on her foot, so that might be called a success.
The little Widow Gray was not going over the _Mauvais Pas_, neither wasMrs. Selwyn, as she had traversed it twice before. So, on reaching theother side, they were just about bidding good-by to the others, when,without a bit of warning, the parson's wife, in turning around, fellflat, and disappeared to the view of some of them behind a boulder ofice.
All was co
nfusion in an instant. The guides rushed--everybodyrushed--pellmell to the rescue; Tom's long legs, as usual, getting himthere first. There she was in a heap, in a depression of ice and snowand water.
"I'm all right, except"--and she couldn't help a grimace of pain--"myfoot."
The little doctor swept them all to one side, as they seated her on oneof the boulders of ice. "Humph! I should think likely," at sight of thetied-up stocking heel. "You stepped on that, and it flung you straightas a die and turned your foot completely over."
"Yes," said Mrs. Henderson. Then she saw the guide who had tied thestocking looking on with a face of great concern. "Oh, don't sayanything, it makes him feel badly," she mumbled, wishing her footwouldn't ache so.
Little Dr. Fisher was rapidly untying the unlucky stocking; and,whipping off the boot, he soon made sure that no ligaments were broken.Then he put on the boot and the woollen sock, being careful to tie itin front over the instep, and whipping out his big handkerchief heproceeded to bandage the ankle in a truly scientific way. "Now, then,Mrs. Henderson, you are all right to take the walk slowly back to thehotel."
Parson Henderson took his wife's hand. "Come, Sarah," he said, gentlyhelping her up.
"Oh, you are going over the _Mauvais Pas_," she cried in distress atthe thought of his missing it.
"Come, Sarah," he said gently, keeping her hand in his.
"I'll go back with her too," said little Dr. Fisher.
"Oh, Adoniram!" exclaimed his wife, but it was under her breath, and noone heard the exclamation.
"I think Dr. Fisher ought to go with the other party; he will be neededthere," Mrs. Selwyn was saying, in her quiet way. "And I will batheMrs. Henderson's foot just as he says it should be done, so good-by,"and any one looking down with a field glass from the Montanvert hotel,could have seen at this point, two parties, one proceeding to the_Mauvais Pas_ and the _Chapeau_, and the other of three ladies, theparson and a guide, wending their way slowly on the return across thecrevasses.