Page:The Father Confessor, Stories of Danger and Death.djvu/194

184 slope they went, clutching the crumbling snow, gliding ever downward to the mouth of a purple crevasse. The end of the tragedy had not come before the girl was back at the glass. She put the others who crowded around her, back with rough hands; they did not resent her passage or dare usurp her place, for she was engaged to one of those three men whowhom [sic] they had for a moment seen so near, and yet were too far off to help.

The girl never moved during the awful minutes of the tragedy which she alone could see. She swayed, moaning and crying for some one to aid the poor victims, and, at last, with a choking cry, fell to the ground, from whence she was tenderly lifted and carried into the house. The moment her eyes left the glass others had taken her place, as full of pity as she, perhaps, yet anxious not to miss the morbid excitement of looking at least upon the disaster, since they were too far away to be of use.

The man who had taken the telescope in his hands, prepared as he was for what he should see, started back at the first glance, then settled to watch in pitiful uselessness.