sea; then it died away and nothing answered him.
He started off again. The sun had sunk behind the mountain tops,

which still were purpled with the reflection from the heavens;
but the depths of the valley were becoming gray, and suddenly the

young man felt frightened. It seemed to him as if the silence,
the cold, the solitude, the wintry death of these mountains were

taking possession of him, were stopping and freezing his blood,
making his limbs grow stiff, and turning him into a motionless

and frozen object; and he began to run rapidly toward the
dwelling. The old man, he thought, would have returned during his

absence. He had probably taken another road; and would, no doubt,
be sitting before the fire, with a dead chamois at his feet.

He soon came in sight of the inn, but no smoke rose from it.
Ulrich ran faster. Opening the door he met Sam who ran up to him

to greet him, but Gaspard Hari had not returned. Kunsi, in his
alarm, turned round suddenly, as if he had expected to find his

comrade hidden in a corner. Then he relighted the fire and made
the soup; hoping every moment to see the old man come in. From

time to time he went out to see if Gaspard were not in sight. It
was night now, that wan night of the mountain, a livid night,

with the crescent moon, yellow and dim, just disappearing behind
the mountain tops, and shining faintly on the edge of the

horizon.
Then the young man went in and sat down to warm his hands and

feet, while he pictured to himself every possible sort of
accident. Gaspard might have broken a leg, have fallen into a

crevasse, have taken a false step and dislocated his ankle.
Perhaps he was lying on the snow, overcome and stiff with the

cold, in agony of mind, lost and perhaps shouting for help,
calling with all his might, in the silence of the night.

But where? The mountain was so vast, so rugged, so dangerous in
places, especially at that time of the year, that it would have

required ten or twenty guides walking for a week in all
directions, to find a man in that immense space. Ulrich Kunsi,

however, made up his mind to set out with Sam, if Gaspard did not
return by one in the morning; and he made his preparations.

He put provisions for two days into a bag, took his steel
climbing-irons, tied a long, thin, strong rope round his waist

and looked to see that his iron-shod stick and his ax, which
served to cut steps in the ice, were in order. Then he waited.

The fire was burning on the hearth, the great dog was snoring in
front of it, and the clock was ticking in its case of resounding

wood, as regularly as a heart beating.
He waited, his ears on the alert for distant sounds, and shivered

when the wind blew against the roof and the walls. It struck
twelve, and he trembled. Then, as he felt frightened and shivery,

he put some water on the fire, so that he might have hot coffee
before starting. When the clock struck one he got up, woke Sam,

opened the door and went off in the direction of the Wildstrubel.
For five hours he ascended, scaling the rocks by means of his

climbing-irons, cutting into the ice, advancing continually" target="_blank" title="ad.不断地，频繁地">continually, and
occasionally hauling up the dog, who remained below at the foot

of some slope that was too steep for him, by means of the rope.
About six o'clock he reached one of the summits to which old

Gaspard often came after chamois, and he waited till it should be
day-light.

The sky was growing pale overhead, and suddenly a strange light,
springing, nobody could tell whence, suddenly illuminated the

immense ocean of pale mountain peaks, which stretched for many
leagues around him. It seemed as if this vague brightness arose

from the snow itself, in order to spread itself into space. By
degrees the highest and most distant summits assumed a delicate,

fleshlike rose color, and the red sun appeared behind the
ponderous giants of the Bernese Alps.

Ulrich Kunsi set off again, walking like a hunter, stooping and
looking for any traces, and saying to his dog: "Seek old fellow,

seek!"
He was descending the mountain now, scanning the depths closely,

and from time to time shouting, uttering a loud, prolonged
familiar cry which soon died away in that silent vastness. Then,

he put his ear to the ground, to listen. He thought he could
distinguish a voice, and so he began to run and shout again. But

he heard nothing more and sat down, worn out and in despair.
Toward midday he breakfasted and gave Sam, who was as tired as

himself, something to eat also; then he recommenced his search.
When evening came he was still walking, having traveled more than

thirty miles over the mountains. As he was too far away to return
home, and too tired to drag himself along any further, he dug a

hole in the snow and crouched in it with his dog, under a blanket
which he had brought with him. The man and the dog lay side by

side, warming themselves one against the other, but frozen to the
marrow, nevertheless. Ulrich scarcely slept, his mind haunted by

visions and his limbs shaking with cold.
Day was breaking when he got up. His legs were as stiff as iron

bars, and his spirits so low that he was ready to weep, while his
heart was beating so that he almost fell with excitement whenever

he thought he heard a noise.
Suddenly he imagined that he ALSO was going to die of cold in the

midst of this vast solitude. The terror of such a death roused
his energies and gave him renewed vigor. He was descending toward

the inn, falling down and getting up again, and followed at a
distance by Sam, who was limping on three legs. They did not

reach Schwarenbach until four o'clock in the afternoon. The house
was empty, and the young man made a fire, had something to eat,

and went to sleep, so worn-out that he did not think of anything
more.

He slept for a long time, for a very long time, the unconquerable
sleep of exhaustion. But suddenly a voice, a cry, a name:

"Ulrich," aroused him from his profoundslumber, and made him sit
up in bed. Had he been dreaming? Was it one of those strange

appeals which cross the dreams of disquieted minds? No, he heard
it still, that reverberating cry,--which had entered at his ears

and remained in his brain,--thrilling him to the tips of his
sinewy fingers. Certainly, somebody had cried out, and called:

"Ulrich!" There was somebody there, near the house, there could
be no doubt of that, and he opened the door and shouted: "Is it

you, Gaspard?" with all the strength of his lungs. But there was
no reply, no murmur, no groan, nothing. It was quite dark, and

the snow looked wan.
The wind had risen, that icy wind which cracks the rocks, and

leaves nothing alive on those deserted heights. It came in sudden
gusts, more parching and more deadly than the burning wind of the

desert, and again Ulrich shouted: "Gaspard! Gaspard! Gaspard!"
Then he waited again. Everything was silent on the mountain! Then

he shook with terror, and with a bound he was inside the inn. He
shut and bolted the door, and then fell into a chair, trembling

all over, for he felt certain that his comrade had called him at
the moment of dissolution.

He was certain of that, as certain as one is of conscious life or
of taste when eating. Old Gaspard Hari had been dying for two

days and three nights somewhere, in some hole, in one of those
deep, untrodden ravines whose whiteness is more sinister than

subterranean darkness. He had been dying for two days and three
nights and he had just then died, thinking of his comrade. His