stood in sparse groups, and amongst their lofty upright stems
Rallywood presently became aware that a strange scene was in progress.

A small party of people were moving about the low-lying ground where the
snow still rested. On that bleak site at the foot of an outstanding pine
two or three men with picks and shovels were hurriedly digging in the
frost-bound earth. Close beside them what looked like a long military
cloak flung at full length lay upon the ground.

The meaning of the incident was manifest. The clouding sky, the river,
the broken pine trees were looking on at a lonely funeral, darkened by a
suggestive furtiveness and haste.

Rallywood put spurs to his horse and galloped down towards the burial
party. Another rider coming at speed across the open sheered off to
intercept him. It was easy to recognise Sagan by his bulk and the
imperious gesture of the hand with which he signed to the younger man to
stop. But Rallywood rode the harder. There was a shout from Sagan, and
the men ran towards the black object on the snow, and by the time
Rallywood reached them the dead body was already laid in its grave.

At the same moment Sagan on the other side of the grave pulled up his
big horse on its haunches. The foresters stood rigid, waiting on the
Count's wishes. He looked over their heads at Rallywood.

'Colendorp has been found,' he said with his most surly bearing.

Rallywood glanced down into the shallow grave; a lump of frosty earth
slipped from the rugged heap above and settled into a crevice of the
cloak that covered Colendorp.

'My men are burying him.'

'By your orders, my lord?'

'By my orders. Can you suggest a better use to make of a dead man?'

'No, my lord, but a better manner of burial.'

'Dismount and see for yourself.'

Rallywood swung off the saddle, and giving his horse to one of the
foresters stooped and threw back the covering from the dead man's face
and breast. His dead fierce eyes stared upward, his wet hair was already
frozen to his brow, and a black wound gaped open at his throat.
Rallywood gazed at the harsh features, which, but for their livid
colour, were little altered by death. The _tsa_ moaned across the river
and a few large flakes of snow came floating down.

'Are you satisfied now?'

Rallywood stood up and faced the Count.

'How did he die?'

'You can see that. Suicide as plain as a knife can write it.'

'I do not think so,' said Rallywood slowly.

The Count's