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Page 144
It is indeed, a fearful place. The torrent, swollen
by the melting snow, plunges into a tremendous abyss,
from which the spray rolls up like the smoke from a
burning house. The shaft into which the river hurls
itself is an immense chasm, lined by glistening
coal-black rock, and narrowing into a creaming,
boiling pit of incalculable depth, which brims over
and shoots the stream onward over its jagged lip. The
long sweep of green water roaring forever down, and
the thick flickering curtain of spray hissing forever
upward, turn a man giddy with their constant whirl and
clamor. We stood near the edge peering down at the
gleam of the breaking water far below us against the
black rocks, and listening to the half-human shout
which came booming up with the spray out of the abyss.
The path has been cut half-way round the fall to
afford a complete view, but it ends abruptly, and the
traveler has to return as he came. We had turned to
do so, when we saw a Swiss lad come running along it
with a letter in his hand. It bore the mark of the
hotel which we had just left, and was addressed to me
by the landlord. It appeared that within a very few
minutes of our leaving, an English lady had arrived
who was in the last stage of consumption. She had
wintered at Davos Platz, and was journeying now to
join her friends at Lucerne, when a sudden hemorrhage
had overtaken her. It was thought that she could
hardly live a few hours, but it would be a great
consolation to her to see an English doctor, and, if I
would only return, etc. The good Steiler assured me
in a postscript that he would himself look upon my
compliance as a very great favor, since the lady
absolutely refused to see a Swiss physician, and he
could not but feel that he was incurring a great
responsibility.
The appeal was one which could not be ignored. It was
impossible to refuse the request of a
fellow-countrywoman dying in a strange land. Yet I
had my scruples about leaving Holmes. It was finally
agreed, however, that he should retain the young Swiss
messenger with him as guide and companion while I
returned to Meiringen. My friend would stay some
little time at the fall, he said, and would then walk
slowly over the hill to Rosenlaui, where I was to
rejoin him in the evening. As I turned away I saw
Holmes, with his back against a rock and his arms
folded, gazing down at the rush of the waters. It was
the last that I was ever destined to see of him in
this world.
When I was near the bottom of the descent I looked
back. It was impossible, from that position, to see
the fall, but I could see the curving path which winds
over the shoulder of the hill and leads to it. Along
this a man was, I remember, walking very rapidly.
I could see his black figure clearly outlined against
the green behind him. I noted him, and the energy with
which he walked but he passed from my mind again as I
hurried on upon my errand.
It may have been a little over an hour before I
reached Meiringen. Old Steiler was standing at the
porch of his hotel.
"Well," said I, as I came hurrying up, "I trust that
she is no worse?"
A look of surprise passed over his face, and at the
first quiver of his eyebrows my heart turned to lead
in my breast.
"You did not write this?" I said, pulling the letter
from my pocket. "There is no sick Englishwoman in the
hotel?"
"Certainly not!" he cried. "But it has the hotel mark
upon it! Ha, it must have been written by that tall
Englishman who came in after you had gone. He said--"
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