athers whirled and
fluttered down upon it through the generous hole in the roof. The
three natives had vanished, sleeping bags and all; and the Ladaki cook,
with the astounding patience of his kind, had coaxed into life a fire
large enough to make his master a cup of tea from the few remaining
spoonfuls of the magic leaf, more priceless to the mountaineer than
brandy.

It was a bad beginning. Even the Gurkhas looked grave, and shook their
heads. The sky, low and heavy with tumbled cloud, was a study in greys
and indigoes; the earth a still, uncharted waste. No whisper of wind
or trees; no sound of life; no break of colour anywhere, from the level
plain to the galaxy of peaks and rounded shoulders tossed aloft like a
frozen tempest. Only at intervals, far up the mountain-sides, black
specks--that were grazing yaks--suggested a Khirgiz encampment
cunningly hidden in the folds of the hills. Presumably the sun was up,
though the east showed as lifeless and unpromising as any other quarter
of the heavens.

A detailed investigation of the commissariat department--revealing a
serious shortage of tea, cocoa, and rice, to say nothing of minor
essentials--proved no less discouraging than the aspect of earth and
sky. Only by the most stringent economy could the little store be
persuaded to last out four days, by which time they hoped to be over
the pass. Lenox, as usual, blamed himself.

"Extra work on siege rations is about our programme!" he remarked with
grim humour to his devoted ally the little Havildar. "We must manage
the first three marches in two days if possible. But I'm sorry to have
let you all in for a risk of this kind."

"All right, Sahib," the Gurkha answered with a brisk salute. "We be
Frontier soldiers. It is not the first time. And 'when sparrows have
picked up the grain where is the use of regret?' If there be enough
for your Honour all is well. The black man can tighten his belt, and
forget that the stomach is empty!" He tightened his own on the spot;
and went off to bid his brothers do likewise on pain of dire penalties.

Stepping down, undismayed, from the voiceless, trackless Roof of the
World, they were met by a desolating wind; the feathered snow-flakes
changed to a storm of sleet,--stinging, saturating; and only the
knowledge that twenty-four hours delay might mean a blocked pass and
another six months of isolation from his kind, induced Lenox to urge
his men forward in the teeth of