Tallie's Knight Part 23

over the pa.s.s."

"Carry the coach?" she squeaked in amazement.

"Are you hoaxing me?"

He grinned.

"Wait and see."

They stopped for the night at the next village, and in the morning

Tallie saw the coach had been dismantled and bound with rope into a number of huge packages. A dozen men and as many mules were a.s.sembled outside the tiny inn. There was much shouting and discussion as the packages was strapped to the mules under the supervision of Maguire.

John Black, Magnus's coachman, watched with phlegmatic English disapproval.

"Oh, the poor things," Tallie said, clutching Magnus's sleeve in distress.

"Those bundles are far too big and heavy for such dear little

animals."

"The porters know what they are about, my dear. Do not concern yourself, they've all--men and mules--done this trip many a time before today."

Tallie looked around.

"And how do we travel?"

"By mule, I believe," he replied.

Tallie looked aghast.

"I cannot ride a mule."Magnus frowned."You have no choice. There are no horses.""It would make no difference if there were. I cannot ride. I have never been on the back of an animal in my life."

Magnus was stumped. He had never heard of such a thing. ; Everyone he knew rode; even the females.

"What, never?"

She shook her head and bit her lip worriedly.

Magnus walked over to Maguire and the head porter and a brief

discussion ensued. Maguire called out an order and a young boy emerged from a nearby barn, carrying a large, odd- shaped wicker basket. He began to strap it to the back of a mule.

Tallie observed the preparations with deep mistrust.Magnus's lips twitched."I am not going over the Alps in that!" she muttered mutinously."Then there is no point in continuing. We shall return to Paris at once," responded Magnus. She flung him a black look, then stalked over to the mule and waited to be helped into the basket. One of the porters reached towards her to do it, but Magnus was there before him. He swung his wife into his arms and set her sideways in the basket. "There you are," he said, tucking a thick bearskin around her to protect her from the cold. It emitted a pungent odour uncomfortably reminiscent of its original unfortunate inhabitant. Tallie wrinkled her nose. Magnus bent forward and kissed her lightly on it.

"As snug as a bug in a rug."

She gave him a baleful look.

"I feel very silly. Why can I not walk, like those men?"

He didn't respond, but glanced over to where Monique, with shrieks and giggles, was being installed likewise on another mule.

"Oh, very well," said Tallie crossly.

"I shall behave myself-but I feel ridiculous."

"Sometimes we must sacrifice dignity for expediency," said Magnus austerely, and walked away.

The ascent was slow and tortuous, the pathway narrowing visibly until it seemed to Tallie's eyes no more than a few inches wide. It was amazing how the porters even knew which was the path, for there were goat tracks leading off it at almost every turn. The men took it in turns to carry the huge packs of their belongings. Tallie thought of all the shopping she had done and felt guilty.

However, she soon cheered up, because the scenery was magnificent: enormous jagged peaks and rough crags, the occasional twisted tree, gnarled and bent by the harsh weather. And the higher they climbed the colder it became, even though it was summer.

The track was narrow and tortuous, but Tallie had no time to be concerned. The most splendid, awe-inspiring vistas lay all around her, and fresh delights were revealed with each turn of the track and each minor peak accomplished. She had never seen anything like it in her life--only imagined it from books like Mrs. Radcliffe's.

And silence seemed to hang in the air all around them. She could see some bird of prey, a falcon or a hawk, perhaps, circling with grim patience over a crag in the distance. She watched it bank and soar effortlessly, then suddenly dive out of sight, and she shivered, imagining some poor tiny creature caught in its talons. The air was cold and crisp and so pure that she felt almost dizzy breathing it.

All she could hear was the stomping of the heavy boots of the men walking close to her and the occasional musical ringing of a mule's horseshoes on a stone. The sound carried in the still, crystal air, rebounding and repeating from the jagged peaks.

Tallie had never heard such a superb echo. She could not resist it.

"h.e.l.loooo," she called. The echo came back to her from a dozen distant crags. Ahead of her Magnus turned on his mule and looked back, as if concerned. She waved.

"h.e.l.looo, echo," she called again and, "Echo-echo-echo," her words came back to her.

One of the porters grinned at her delighted face and began to sing. In seconds others joined in, strong male voices, deep and true, ringing through the mountains with the joy of being young and strong and alive. Someone up ahead began a harmony and another man joined him, then another. An older man with a thick white beard began a third line of harmony, a deep ba.s.s, and more voices joined him. The mountains threw back the sound, magnifying it and leaving a trail of echoes to mingle with the harmonies. It was better by far than any choir Tallie had heard. It had none of the solemnity and restraint of I a choir. There was something special about a score or morel l.u.s.ty male voices, ringing in the open air, echoing with the confidence of strength and vigour as their heavy boots pounded out the rhythm. Music rolled and swirled and echoed around the mountains.

Tallie was enchanted. She sat spellbound, drinking in the wonder of what was happening. Here was plain, ordinary Tallie Robinson--who had once thought she would never go any where--and now look at her!

Almost at the very top of the 1 world, gazing at what was surely one of the most utterly splendiferous sights imaginable. And listening to the most glorious music in the world. And up ahead rode her handsome, magnificent husband. And she was almost in Italy, where she should be able to discover the truth about her mother's death. And she was going to have a baby. The cold mountain air p.r.i.c.kled at her eyes and she had to grope for a handkerchief to wipe her eyes. It was odd how easily she cried these days, she reflected, when really she had nothing to cry about.

She finished wiping her eyes, then, noticing one of the porters watching her, began to clap her cold hands in time to the music, humming along to the tune. With the singing, the time pa.s.sed more quickly, until at last the porters stopped and Magnus came to lift her

out of the basket."Could you hear the singing from up ahead? Wasn't it utterlywonderful?" she said, stretching her cramped limbs.

"Very nice," he responded."Are you warm enough?" He took her small cold hands in his and beganto chafe them gently. His hands were not exactly warm themselves, and she became concerned when she saw he looked rather heavy-eyed andpreoccupied."Are you all right?" she asked.He shrugged."Picked up a bit of a chill, I suspect. Nothing to worry about. Now, I think those fellows have brandy, or some such local brew. I want you to have a little--keep the cold out."

She looked around.

"Magnus, what are they doing?"The porters were unloading the mules. Magnus went to discuss it withthem. He came back, a faint grin on his face.

"This is as far as the mules go. And now, my dear, you will have to

resign yourself to being carried."

Sure enough, the men had brought out some rough-looking woven wicker litters attached to crude poles. They gestured to Magnus, and Tallie went forward reluctantly.

In minutes she was installed in a litter, tied down--for safety, they

said--and packed in straw, as well as bearskins, for warmth.

"I feel ridiculous," she said. Magnus chuckled and wound a thick woollen shawl around her face.

"You look quite delightful, my dear."

Tallie could hardly move, so she directed an almost invisible glare at

him.

"Monsieur?" said a porter. Magnus turned. The porter gestured to another litter, sitting beside Tallie's.

"Please, monsieur, we must hurry.""What? I don't need a blasted litter!" said Magnus, outraged.The porter shrugged."It is the only way, monsieur. The way we move, no one who was not born in these mountains can keep up with us. You must go in the

chair."

A m.u.f.fled giggle came from the bundle that was Tallie. Magnus hesitated, stiff with annoyance.

"An inexperienced person will slow us down. And there are wolves, monsieur, and bears."

Magnus didn't budge.

"And madame, she is getting cold, monsieur.""Oh, very well--d.a.m.n your eyes!" said Magnus, and allowed himself tobe strapped into the litter. Tallie watched in glee as her immaculate,elegant husband was bundled into a litter and wrapped until he lookedlike a pile of old washing. Two porters hoisted his litter onto theirshoulders with a jolt. They moved forward.

"Oh, Magnus?" called Tallie as he came alongside her. The porters paused.

Magnus glared across at her.

"What?" he snapped.

"Sometimes we must sacrifice dignity for expediency, my dear," she said solemnly.

Magnus swore and ordered the porters to move on.

"Don't worry, my dear," she called.

"You look delightful in your litter, too."

He swore again, and her laughter followed him up the steep pathway.

The porters must be part mountain goat, Tallie decided breathlessly after an hour of climbing. There were four for each litter and they leaped up impossibly steep slopes at a pace which Tallie doubted she could maintain on flat ground for more than a minute.

On one side, the narrow, winding path dropped away to a bottomless precipice, on the other were violently soaring peaks and huge vertical slabs of rock. There was no room to manoeuvre; the slightest misstep would have them plunging hundreds of feet over the precipice, to perish on the ragged rocks below. The porters didn't even pause or blink when Tallie heard what she was sure were wolves howling in the not very far distance. She hardly dared to breathe.

Tallie heaved a sigh of relief when they came to the top of the pa.s.s and stopped for a break of perhaps a minute or two. The view was superb. In every direction lay mountain peaks-some glittering with snow--sharp against the crisp vivid blue of the sky. On one side of them was France, down there somewhere below was Italy, and across in the distance were the peaks of Switzerland. It was a moment to remember, she thought excitedly, a moment to tell her children. She laid her hand on her flat stomach, marvelling, still unable to believe that there was a baby growing inside her.

With a sudden jolt, she found herself on the move again, this time at a breathtaking pace. The bearers ran, rather than walked, taking tiny little steps where the path was most perilous and great bounding strides when it levelled out or widened.

Tallie clung on like grim death, bouncing and swaying.

Finally they came to a tiny village, which clung to the side of the mountains in apparent impossibility. The panting porters set down the litters and one of them came forward to lift her out. She looked for her husband. He was still in his litter. She hurried over on stiff legs.

"Magnus was that not the most terrifyingly thril?-Magnus, are you all right?"

His face was death-pale, his eyes closed. He did not move.

She pulled her gloves off and felt his forehead with her hand. Despite the chill in the air, his forehead was hot and clammy.