A shout from below caught her attention. Looking down she saw four of the teams of climbers all scaling the mountain by different routes; but the nearest was a good three hundred feet below the level of the cave. Still gasping for breath she shouted back. But her cry was one of despair, for the teams were moving upward only at a crawl, and she knew that they could not possibly arrive in time to save her- unless, unless she could find somewhere to hide.
As she looked down she saw that about eight feet below the platform on which she stood there was another ledge. If she could reach it and crouch back against the rock face beneath the overhang she might conceal herself there while the Great Ram, failing to find her at the entrance to the cave, supposed that she was hiding in one of the cabins. By the time he had searched them all there was at least a chance that help might reach her.
Two of the stanchions that supported the terminus of the cable railway were embedded in the lower ledge. Running along to the platform, she threw herself flat upon it, then wriggled backwards until her legs were dangling in space. A few wild kicks and they closed round the stanchion. There followed an awful moment as she lowered herself until she could also grip it with her hands. The ice-cold metal bit into them with savage heat. She gave a gasp of pain, released her hold and slid the last few feet to fall with a bump in the snow. Tears were now streaming down her face but, picking herself up, she scrambled along to the deepest indenture in the cliff wall and crouched down there.
Yet her final bid to outwit the Great Ram was doomed to failure. He had followed her wild flight at only walking pace, but as soon as he reached the rock platform his intuition told him where she was. She had not been crouching beneath the overhang for much more than a minute when she heard him call to her from above to come out.
She tried to crouch further back against the rock, but it was no good. Despite her efforts to remain where she was she found herself standing up and walking forward. The ledge was about ten feet wide. When she had covered half the distance he ordered her to stop, turn round and look up at him. Unresisting now, she did as she was bid.
Tall, dark, saturnine, he stood right on the edge of the big platform looking down at her, his thin mouth curved in a smile. To her amazement his expression was no longer harsh or cynical, but, for the first time she had seen it on his face, a kindly one. And when he spoke his voice was gentle.
'Circe, sometime neophyte of the Ram, I did you an injustice. Although it was impossible for you to defeat me, you have proved a more worthy opponent than I supposed any woman could. It is a tragedy that you should have chosen to adhere to the Christian heresy; otherwise you might have shared with me in ten minutes time the triumph for which I have worked so long. Had we met earlier I would have converted you to the true faith, and done you the honour to allow you to serve me both as a woman and a friend. As it is, in recognition of your courage, I will accord you mercy. Instead of inflicting my curse upon you, or sending my dark inner self to consume you in agony, as I did with the stupid giant you made your tool, I decree for you a swift and painless death. Turn about now and walk forward to the end decreed for you.'
Before Mary had grasped the full significance of his words, she found that she had turned round. An intangible but irresistible force pressed upon her back. She strove to keep her legs rigid and her feet planted firmly, but the pressure against her shoulders increased, bending her forward. To keep her balance she was compelled to put out first one foot and then the other. Two more steps and she was on the edge of the ledge. Immediately below her was a nearly sheer drop of a thousand feet.
In front of her the snow-capped peaks of the range on the other side of the valley glistened in the sunshine. Owing to the clear, rarefied atmosphere they looked so near that she could almost have stepped across to them, but actually they were miles away. Above them puffs of white cloud hung unmoving in a blue summer sky. Her eyes dropped to the green valley, with its toy tanks and tiny figures on the far side of the narrow, rushing stream. Then, much nearer, there were the teams of climbers. They had all halted and some men among them had rifles to their shoulders. One flashed. It was only then her brain registered the fact that they had been firing for some minutes.
Suddenly she realized that they were firing at the Great Ram. A final hope stirred in her. If he were hit she would be reprieved from death. Frantically now she dug her heels into the hard snow and used every ounce of strength she had to throw herself backward. But her effort was useless. All she could achieve was to remain upright. And deep down in herself she knew that the Great Ram would not be hit. The magic aura with which he could surround himself would deflect the bullets.
Still she battled to maintain her balance, pitting her will against his. But his was the stronger. Her head bowed under the pressure so that she was staring down into the abyss. Then, like an officer giving the order to a firing squad to shoot, she heard him call down to her the one word, 'Jump.'
She flexed her knees, swayed sideways, threw up her arms, and with a wild cry fell outward into space.
***
Immediately after receiving the radio message about Lothar's broadcast Verney asked the Lieutenant leading his party to circulate to all the other climbing teams an urgent signal. So far the troops had been told only that they were on an emergency operation and must get up to the cave for the purpose of arresting with the least possible delay anyone they found in it. Now they were told that in the cave there was a madman who had stolen an H bomb, and that he planned to let it off at midday. They were then called on to take risks if necessary and make an all-out effort to reach the cave in time. Verney also took it on himself to promise quadruple pensions for the dependants of men who might be injured or killed in the attempt, and rich rewards and honours for the first three teams to reach the cave. They were told, too, that although other teams were on the way to the far entrance of the cave, these had had to make a wide detour before starting their climb, so there was no chance of their reaching the goal first. In consequence, success or failure depended on the teams that had set out on the direct route up from the wrecked engine-house.
There was no more that he could do; yet within the next few minutes it was apparent that the message had galvanized the troops into considerably swifter progress, and his own party resumed the climb at a faster pace.
As the officer or N.C.O. leading each party carried a walkie-talkie set the Sergeant with Barney's team had received the radio message relayed from Berne at the same time as his Lieutenant. The moment Barney heard of it he too realized that only a superhuman effort could enable them to reach the cave before midday, and without waiting for C.B.'s message he urged his party to greater speed.
For the amateurs the pace on the easier stretches became grinding; yet the harder ones caused them more distress from their very slowness on them, and the time it took to cut steps in the ice or plough through patches of soft snow. Many times they slipped and would, perhaps, have fallen to their deaths had it not been for the strong surefooted Alpine troops to whom they were roped before and behind.
At times Barney almost despaired of reaching the cave at all. Every hundred feet or so his party found itself confronted with a great mass of overhanging rock, round which a way had to be worked, or a narrow, almost vertical chimney that had to be climbed as the only means of continuing the ascent. In one case they had to cross a glacier and, in another, edge their way along thirty feet of ledge that was in no place more than eighteen inches wide. Not daring to look down, he kept his eyes fixed on the man in front of him, endeavouring to follow his footsteps exactly, but a dozen times his heart was in his mouth and he feared that at any moment he would fall headlong over the precipice.