f the drifting snowflakes.

"We must go on," she sighed.

In his memory the chill of her kiss was bitter. In the forest they could
speak no more of love.

But Bobby, hand in hand with her as they hurried after the others,
received a new strength. He saw as a condition to their happiness the
unveiling of the mystery at the Cedars. He gathered his courage for that
task. He would not give way even before the memory of all that he had
experienced, even before the return of his grandfather, even before the
revelation toward which they walked. And side by side with his
determination grew shame for his former weakness. It was comforting to
realize that the causes for his weakness and his strength were identical.

The subdued murmur of voices reached them. They saw among the indistinct
masses of the trees restless patches of black. Katherine stumbled against
one of the fallen stones. They stood with the others in the burial
ground, close to the mound that had been made that day.

"They haven't begun," Bobby whispered.

She freed her hand.

A white flame sprang across the mound. The trees from formless masses
took on individual shapes. A row of cypresses on which the light gleamed
were like sombre sentinels, guarding the dead. The snow patches,
clustered on their branches, were like funeral decorations pointing their
morbid function. The light gave the overturned stones an illusion of
striving to struggle from their white imprisonment. Robinson swung his
lamp back to the mound.

"The snow isn't heavy," he said, "and the ground isn't frozen. It
oughtn't to take long."

Silas Blackburn commenced to shake.

"It's a desecration of the dead."

"We have to know," Robinson said, "who is buried in that grave."

With a spade Jenkins scraped the snow from the mound. Rawlins joined him.
They commenced to throw to one side, staining the white carpet, spadesful
of moist, yellow earth. Their labour was rapid. Silas Blackburn watched
with an unconquerable fascination. He continued to shake.

"I'm too cold. I'll never be warm again," he whined. "If anything happens
to me, Bobby, try to forget I've been hard, and don't let them bury me.
Suppose I should be buried alive?"

"Suppose," Paredes said, "you were buried alive to-day?"

He turned to Bobby and Katherine.

"That also is possible. You remember the old theories that have never
been disproved of the disintegration of matter into its atoms, of its
passage through solid sub