to his bed furniture to
bring him out in a light blaze. She experienced a great revulsion of
relief when she began to recognize the mysterious sound that had
attracted her attention. It was sleet--no longer slyly touching the glass
here and there, but dashing with all the force of the wind in tinkling
showers against it. The sound had its chilly influence even before the
warm fire.

Suddenly the shock of the bell, jangling out its summons in the dark cold
hall! Again Lillian's composed, swift exit in response. Crystal had
answered, and here was Mr. Julian Bayne at the hotel and on the wire.
Could he come to her at once, at her utmost need, and by the first train?
Oh! (at last a poignant cadence of pain) there was no train? Crystal was
not on a railroad at all? (A pause of silent, listening expectancy, then
the keen vibration of renewed hope.) Oh, could he? Could he really drive
across country? But wasn't it too far? Oh, a fast horse? Fifty miles? But
weren't the roads dreadful?

"Oh--oh, Gladys, he has rung off! He was in such a hurry I could hardly
understand him. I could hear him calling out his orders in the hotel
office to have his horse harnessed, while he was talking to me."

The effort was triumphantly made, and Julian Bayne was coming, but as she
returned from the chill hall to the illumined, warm room the tinkle of
ice on the window-pane caught her attention for the first time.

"Snow?" she said, appalled; then, listening a moment: "And there is
sleet! I wonder if it is more than a flurry."

She ran to the window, but, already frozen, the sash refused to rise. She
pressed her cheek to the pane and beheld aghast a ghostly and sheeted
world, so fast had the snowflakes fallen, and still the sleet sent its
crystal fusillade against the glass.

"Oh!" she exclaimed, "Julian Bayne can never come safely through this ice
storm and up the mountain. Listen--listen! It is hailing now! Oh, he will
break his neck! Remember what a wild and savage thing it is that Julian
Bayne calls a fast horse! He will lose his way in the woods and freeze to
death; and after all, it is perhaps for nothing. I can wait--I can
wait--time is not _so_ essential. Oh, I will postpone his coming! I will
call him up again! Run, Gladys, ring the bell! Call up Long Distance! I
can't get there quickly enough."

And indeed it seemed some feeble old woman hirpling through the shadows,
rather than the vigorous commanding presence of a few minutes ag