that Frank King eagerly welcomed her proposal, and in
due course the two carriages drove away from the big, bare hostelry to
enter the unknown mountain-world.

A strange world they found it, when once they had left the level of the
little valley and begun to climb the steep and twisting road cut on the
face of the mountain. The aspect of things changed every few minutes,
as the rolling mists slowly blotted out this or that portion of the
landscape, or settled down so close that they could see nothing but the
wet snow in the road, and the black-stemmed pines beyond, with their
green branches stretching out towards them through the pall of cloud.
Then sometimes they would look down into extraordinary gulfs of
mist--extraordinary because, far below them, they would find the top of
a fir-tree, the branches laden with snow, the tree itself apparently
resting on nothing--floating in mid air. It was a phantasmal world
altogether, the most cheerful feature of it being that at last the snow
had ceased to fall.

This decided Nan to get out for a walk.

'You will be wet through,' her elder sister exclaimed.

'My boots are thick,' said Nan, 'and Parsons has my waterproof.'

When she had got down, and disappeared, Miss Beresford said,

'She is a strange girl; she always wants to be alone.'

'She seems to think a great deal, and she always thinks in her own
way,' said Frank King. 'No doubt she prefers to be alone; but--but
don't you think I ought to get out and see that she is all right?'

'There are no brigands in these mountains, are there?' said Miss
Beresford, laughing.

'And she can't lose her way,' said the more serious Edith, 'unless she
were to fall over the side.'

'I think I will get out,' he said, and he called to the driver.

He found that Nan was already some way ahead, or rather overhead; but
he soon overtook her. She was startled when she saw him, for the snow
had deadened the sound of his approach.

'I believe it will clear soon,' he said at a venture.

'It is altogether very strange,' Nan said in something of a lower
voice. 'The fir-trees laden with snow like that, the cold, the gloom:
it looks like some bygone Christmas come back suddenly. It is strange
to find yourself in another part of the year: yesterday, summer;
to-day, winter. I should not be surprised to meet a cart filled with
holly, or to hear the bells ringing for morning service.'

'You know there are people who never see winter,' s