The Iron
Crown

The next morning we rose later than usual, for I knew the party would need a good night's sleep to cope with the few remaining difficulties ahead, and breakfasted in an atmosphere of tense silence.

Down we started, each step sending a shower of pebbles and slate splinters into the valley where they bounced on, down, and out of sight without a sound.

I walked at the end of the small file to protect us against attack from the rear, but after a few hundred yards Denis abruptly gesticulated that we were to change places.

It seemed that despite his aetherial bearing he was no keener to be showered with stones than I was.

But I obeyed for no better reason than the impossibility of argument, and in a few minutes the path became so horribly precipitous that it was only the most trivial inconvenience to be bombarded with these rocks.

Soon our way lay down a vertical cliff and all began to despair of their lives.

I began to realize that for me at least there would be no going back, and wished that we had buried Wollis properly.

His corpse we had wedged in the fork of a withered tree, thinking that his body was its own memorial; but if we had buried him according to the King's ritual we might have taken his rope and his crampons, which he wore next to his heart, and which would have served us well at this juncture.