ust as you did. There was no use trying the
impossible."

"But we will return in March----" began Blair.

"Perhaps," said Crane, a little preoccupied in manner, "or I will send a
search party myself. There's no reason you boys should go."

This was a real relief, for though more than willing, the two men were
far from anxious to undertake the gruesome errand.

"And now," their host went on, "if you agree, I'll send for Mrs. Crane.
At first, I thought I'd rather tell her the news when we were by
ourselves,--but, I know there are questions she will want to ask you,
things that I might not think of,--and I know you'll be willing to
answer her."

All unconscious of the scene awaiting her, Mrs. Crane came into the
room.

A bewildered look on her sweet, placid face showed her inability to
grasp the situation quickly.

Then, "Why, boys," she cried, "when did you come home? Where's Peter?"

To the others' relief Benjamin Crane told his wife of their mutual loss.
Very gently he told her, very lovingly he held her hand and comforted
her crushed and breaking heart. Shelby and Blair instinctively turned
aside from the pitiful scene and waited to be again addressed.

At length Mrs. Crane turned her tear-stained face to them. Not so calm
as her husband, she begged for details, then she wept and sobbed so
hysterically she could scarcely hear them. Her thoughts flew back to the
years when Peter was a lad, a child, a baby,--and her talk of him became
almost incoherent.

"There, there, dear," Benjamin Crane said, smoothing her hair, "try to
be quieter,--you will make yourself ill. Perhaps, boys, you'd better go
now, and come round again to-morrow evening."

"No, no!" cried Mrs. Crane; "stay longer,--tell me more. Tell me
everything he said or did,--all the time you were gone. Did he know he
was going to die?"

"Oh, no, Mrs. Crane," Shelby assured her. "It was an accident, you see.
The storm was beyond anything you can imagine. The wind was not only icy
and cutting, but of a sharp viciousness that made it impossible to hear
or to see. Almost impossible to walk. We merely struggled blindly
against it,--_against_ it, you understand, so that if Peter, who was
behind, had called out, we could not have heard him."

"Why was he last?" demanded Mrs. Crane.

"It happened so," replied Shelby. "I've tried hard to think if we were
to blame for that,--but I cannot see that we were. Whenever we walked
single file, we fell into line i