he mountain, and my eyes followed hers.
A great cloud hid the grim outstanding summit.

"If only you had prevented him from going!" she cried back at me in a
last reproach; and to me her tone was conclusive, it rang so true, and
so invidiously free from the smaller emotions which it had been my own
unhappiness to inspire. It was the real woman who had spoken out once
more, suddenly, perhaps unthinkingly, but obviously from her heart. And
as she turned, I followed her very slowly and without a word; for now
was I surely and deservedly undone.

CHAPTER XI

THE LION'S MOUTH

It was a chilly morning, with rather a high wind; from the haze about
the mountains of the Zermatt valley, which were all that I could see
from my bedroom window, it occurred to me that I might look in vain for
the Matterhorn from the other side of the hotel. It was still visible,
however, when I came down, a white cloud wound about its middle like a
cloth, and the hotel telescope already trained upon its summit from the
shelter of the glass veranda.

"See anybody?" I asked of a man who sat at the telescope as though his
eye was frozen to the lens. He might have been witnessing the most
exciting adventure, where the naked eye saw only rock and snow, and cold
grey sky; but he rose at last with a shake of the head, a great gaunt
man with kind keen eyes, and the skin peeled off his nose.

"No," said he, "I can't see anybody, and I'm very glad I can't. It's
about as bad a morning for it as you could possibly have; yet last night
was so fine that some fellows might have got up to the hut, and been
foolish enough not to come down again. But have a look for yourself."

"Oh, thanks," said I, considerably relieved at what I heard, "but if you
can't see anybody I'm sure I can't. You have done it yourself, I
daresay?"

The gaunt man smiled demurely, and the keen eyes twinkled in his flayed
face. He was, indeed, a palpable mountaineer.

"What, the Matterhorn?" said he, lowering his voice and looking about
him as if on the point of some discreditable admission. "Oh, yes, I've
done the Matterhorn, back and front and both sides, with and without
guides; but everybody has, in these days. It's nothing when you know the
ropes and chains and things. They've got everything up there now except
an iron staircase. Still, I should be sorry to tackle it to-day, even if
they had a lift!"

"Do you think guides would?" I asked, less reassured than I had felt a