Read Online Death in Kashmir by M. M. Kaye - Free Book Online Page B

some twenty or so members of the Ski Club packed their rucksacks with sandwiches and Thermos flasks, and strapping on their skis set off on the long climb through the pine forests up to the open snowfields of Khilanmarg.
    *   *   *
    The day had been all too short, and with the lengthening shadow of evening a chill had crept over the snowfields, and those of the party who were returning to the hotel drained the last drops of tea from their Thermos flasks, ate the last crumbs of cake, and buckled on their skis for the homeward run. One by one their small figures, dark against the rosy-tinted snow and dwarfed by the lowering bulk of Apharwat whose steep sides rise up from the gentle slopes of Khilanmarg, swooped away across the sparkling levels to vanish among the shadows of the pine woods.
    Sarah, who had been skiing in Christmas Gully with Ian Kelly and the Coply twins, paused on the ridge of the Gully to watch the nightly miracle of the sunset. ‘Isn’t it wonderful!’ she said on a breath of rapture.
    A girl’s voice spoke from behind her: ‘Yes, it is pretty good, isn’t it? Like a transformation scene in a pantomime—not quite real.’
    Sarah turned sharply to find Janet Rushton leaning upon her ski-sticks at the rim of the Gully and looking down to where a spangle of lights pinpricked the distant cup of purple shadows that was Gulmarg.
    â€˜Hello!’ said Sarah, surprised. ‘I didn’t know you were staying up here for the night. I suppose you’ve taken Hugo’s place? The fourteenth man.’
    â€˜Yes. I couldn’t resist it. I didn’t mean to stay, but Reggie brought pressure to bear. Said the party might develop the jitters if they discovered they were thirteen. Load of old rubbish really; and anyway, his efforts have been wasted.’
    â€˜But you’re staying?’
    â€˜Yes; I said I would. Besides—well anyway it’s too late now. The others have gone and it would only cause comment if I insisted on rushing after them on my own.’
    â€˜Why? What’s happened?’
    â€˜Nothing much, except that Evadne Curtis has developed tummy trouble or cold feet or something, and I’ve just heard that she decided to go back to the hotel after all, and those two, Thinley and Whatsisname, have gone down with her. She comes from their part of the world and it appears that both of them are rivals for her hand. So naturally neither of them was going to let her go with the other. All very understandable, but it means we’re now only eleven and I needn’t have said I’d fill in for Hugo, after all. Oh well——!’
    Sarah was conscious of a sudden wave of relief. She had watched the small dark figures of the homeward-bound skiers vanish among the pine woods with a feeling of heavy foreboding that she had not wished to analyse, but which she now realized had its roots in the fear that somewhere down in that rapidly darkening hollow far below, death lay in wait for Janet; death tiptoeing along the black, snow-powdered verandahs of the old hotel, or lurking among the shadows at the foot of Blue Run. But now Janet would not be there. She was here, and safe; far above the shadows of the black, watching trees and the secretive wooden walls of the old hotel. Here in a clean, fresh, frosty world. Safe …
    Sarah laughed aloud in sheer relief. ‘Come on,’ she said, ‘race you to the hut.’
    She was a good skier; but Janet was an excellent one, and drawing ahead effortlessly she arrived with a swish of flung snow at the hut a full sixty seconds ahead of Sarah, who found her leaning against the far corner of it and dusting the snow off her suit. Her gaze was on the dim hollow far below them and her face in the waning light was once again strained and anxious.
    She said abruptly and in an undertone: ‘I shouldn’t have stayed up here. It’s too great a risk. I’ve been a fool. I