st keep to the
beaten track.

"I was quite mistaken," she said. "I see now that the path I was
trying to reach leads here only. And I am very, very sorry I disturbed
you."

[Illustration: "I fear I have alarmed you, _fraeulein_."
_Page 88_]

He hobbled nearer, the ruin of a fine man, with a nobly proportioned
head and shoulders, but sadly maimed by the accident which, to all
appearances, made him useless as a guide.

"Pardon an old man's folly, _fraeulein_," he said humbly. "I thought
none could hear, and I felt the loss of my little girl more than ever
to-day."

"Your daughter? Is she buried here?"

"Yes. Many a year has passed; but I miss her now more than ever. She
was all I had in the world, _fraeulein_. I am alone now, and that is a
hard thing when the back is bent with age."

Helen's eyes grew moist; but she tried bravely to control her voice.
"Was she young?" she asked softly.

"Only twenty, _fraeulein_, only twenty, and as tall and fair as
yourself. They carried her here sixteen years ago this very day. I did
not even see her. On the previous night I fell on Corvatsch."

"Oh, how sad! But why did she die at that age? And in this splendid
climate? Was her death unexpected?"

"Unexpected!" He turned and looked at the huge mountain of which the
cemetery hill formed one of the lowermost buttresses. "If the Piz
della Margna were to topple over and crush me where I stand, it would
be less unforeseen than was my sweet Etta's fate. But I frighten you,
lady,--a poor return for your kindness. That is your way,--through
the village, and by the postroad till you reach a notice board telling
you where to take the path."

There was a crude gentility in his manner that added to the pathos of
his words. Helen was sure that he wished to be left alone with his
memories. Yet she lingered.

"Please tell me your name," she said. "I may visit St. Moritz while I
remain here, and I shall try to find you."

"Christian Stampa," he said. He seemed to be on the point of adding
something, but checked himself. "Christian Stampa," he repeated, after
a pause. "Everybody knows old Stampa the guide. If I am not there, and
you go to Zermatt some day--well, just ask for Stampa. They will tell
you what has become of me."

She found it hard to reconcile this broken, careworn old man with her
cheery companion of the previous afternoon. What did he mean? She
understood his queer jargon of Italianized