stairs and laid
it before the kitchen fire, he kept repeating to himself, as if in a
last effort to rouse some moral enthusiasm: "What a band of cut-throats
they are!"

Christine woke the next morning to find the sun shining on an unbroken
sheet of snow. The storm had passed in the night. She dressed quickly and
went down to find the kitchen empty, and the track of footsteps in the
snow leading away in the direction of the tool-house. Her coffee was
bubbling and slices of bacon neatly laid in the frying pan were ready for
cooking. She thought he might have stayed and cooked it for her.

"No one will come as early as this," she thought, plaintively.

But hardly had she finished her simple meal, when the sound of sleigh
bells reached her ears, and running to the window she saw that Ussher and
Hickson in a two horse sleigh were driving down the slope.

A moment later they were in the kitchen. And after the minimum time had
elapsed during which all three talked at once recounting their own
individual anxieties, Ussher asked:

"Where's Max?"

Christine cast down her eyes with a sort of Paul-and-Virginia expression,
as she answered: "Oh, he is sleeping in the tool-house!"

"Well, I call that damned nonsense," said Ussher. "Let a man freeze to
death! Upon my word, Christine, I thought you had more sense." And he
strode away to the back door. "Yes, here are his tracks, poor fellow."
Ussher went out after him, and Hickson turned back.

"But _you_ think I was right, don't you, Edward?" said Christine, for she
had never failed to elicit commendation from Edward.

But now his brow was dark. "But, I say, Christine," he said, "there's one
thing I don't understand. These tracks of his footsteps in the snow."

"He didn't fly, Ned, even if he is an aviator."

"Yes, but it didn't stop snowing until four o'clock this morning."

How irritating the weather always is, Christine thought. For though she
was willing to use scandal as a weapon over Riatt, she was not sure that
she wished to put it into Hickson's hands.

She thought hard, and then said brightly:

"Oh, perhaps he came back for his breakfast before I was up."

Hickson shook his head: "They only lead one way," he said.

In the face of the tactlessness of hard facts, Christine decided to
create a diversion.

"I can't stand here gossiping about the conduct of an aviator," she said,
"when there's so much to be done. Look at all these dirty plates. What
ought to be d