on his boots again, and ran out, calling on
the guide to accompany him. They took out with them a lighted torch,
but it was instantly extinguished by the streaming rain. Julian and the
guide shouted at the top of their voices, but heard no sound in reply;
and the darkness was now so intense, that it was madness to proceed
farther amid that howling storm.

They ran back to the inn, where the rest sat round the table, pale and
trembling with excessive fear. In reply to their hasty questions,
Julian could only shake his head sorrowfully.

"The guide says that in all probability they must have been overtaken by
the storm, and have run to some chalet for refuge. If so, they will be
safe and well-treated till the morning."

"You children had better go to bed," said Mr Kennedy to Eva and Cyril,
who reluctantly obeyed. "You cannot be of any help, and directly the
storm begins to abate, Julian and I will go and find the others."

"Oh, papa," sobbed Eva; "poor Eddy and Violet! What will become of
them? Perhaps they have been struck by the lightning."

"They are in God's hand, dearest," he said, tenderly kissing her tearful
face, "as we all are. In His hand they are as safe as we."

"In God's hand, dear Eva," said Julian, as he bade her good-night. "Go
to sleep, and no doubt they will be here safe before you awake."

"I shall not sleep, Julian," she whispered; "I shall go and pray for
their safety. Dear, dear Eddy and Violet."

Cyril lingered in the room.

"Do let me stay up with you, Julian. I couldn't sleep--indeed, I
couldn't; and I might be of some use when morning comes, and when you go
to look for them. Do let me stay, Julian."

Julian could not resist his brother's wish, though Mr Kennedy thought
it best that the boy should go to bed.

So they compromised matters by getting him to lie down on the sofa,
while they sat up, and stared out of the windows silently into the rain.
How wearily the time goes by when you dread a danger which no action
can avert.

Meanwhile the objects of their anxiety had hurried up to the light, and
found that it came from the ragged windows of an old tumble-down
tenement, built of pine-boards which the sun had dried and charred,
until they looked black and stained and forbidding. Going up the rotten
wooden steps to the door, and looking through the broken windows,
Kennedy saw two men seated, smoking, with a flaring tallow candle
between them.

"Must we go in there?" as