about half past two in the afternoon
Their way back to the path where they had separated from Colonel Dene was long and toilsome . Sepp did his best to beguile it with hunter 's yarns , more or less true , at any rate just as acceptable as if they had been proved and sworn to . Like a good South German he hated Prussia and all its works , and his tales were mostly of Berliners who had wandered thither and been abused ; of the gentleman who had been told , and believed , that the `` gams '' slept by hooking its horns into crevices of the rock , swinging thus at ease , over precipices ; of another whom Federl once deterred from going on the mountains by telling how a chamois , if enraged , charged and butted ; of a third who went home glad to have learned that the chamois produced their peculiar call by bringing up a hind leg and whistling through the hoof . It was about half past two in the afternoon and Ruth began to be very , very tired , when a Jodel from Sepp greeted the `` Hütte '' and the white cross rising behind it . As they toiled up the steep path to the little alm , Ruth said , `` I do n't see Papa , but there are people there . '' A man in a summer helmet , wound with a green veil , came to the edge of the wooden platform and looked down at them ; he was presently joined by two ladies , of whom one disappeared almost immediately , but they could see the other still looking down until a turn in the path brought them to the bottom of some wooden steps , close under the platform . On climbing these they were met at the top by the gentleman , hat in hand , who spoke in French to Gethryn , while the stout , friendly lady held out both hands to Ruth and cried , in pretty broken English : `` Ah !