Again her eyes roamed over Dinah, and again they passed her to scan the mist-wreathed mountains.

Dinah slipped a loving hand through her arm.  “He is not here, dear,” she said.  “Come and sit down for a little!  The sun won’t be gone yet.  We can watch it go.”

She tried to draw her gently along the verandah, but Isabel resisted.  “No—­no!  I am not going that way.  I have to go up the mountains to meet him.  Don’t keep me!  Don’t keep me!”

Dinah threw an anxious look around.  There was no one near them.  Rose had moved away to join a group just returned from the rink.  The laughter and gay voices rose on the still air in merry chorus.  No one knew or cared of the living tragedy so near.

Pleadingly she turned to Isabel.  “Darling Mrs. Everard, need you go now?  Wait till the morning!  It is so late now.  It will soon be dark.”

Isabel made a sharp gesture of impatience.  “Be quiet, child!  You don’t understand.  Of course I must go now.  I have escaped from them, and if I wait I shall be taken again.  It would kill me to be kept back now.  I must meet him in the dawn on the mountain-top.  What was it you called it?  The peaks of Paradise!  That is where I shall find him.  But I must start at once—­at once.”

She threw another furtive look around, and stepped forth.  Dinah’s hand closed upon her arm.  “If you go, I am coming too,” she said, with quick resolution.  “But won’t you wait a moment—­just a moment—­while I run and get some gloves?”

Isabel made a swift effort to disengage herself.  “No, child, no!  I can’t wait.  If you met Eustace, he would make you tell him where you were going, and then he would follow and bring me back.  No, I must go now—­at once.  Yes, you may come too if you like.  But you mustn’t keep me back.  I must go quickly—­quickly—­before they find out.  Everything depends on that.”

There was no delaying her.  Dinah cast another look towards the chattering group, and gave up hope.  She dared not leave her, for she had no idea of the whereabouts of either of the brothers.  And there was no time to make a search.  The only course open to her was to accompany her friend whithersoever the fruitless quest should lead.  She was convinced that Isabel’s physical powers of endurance were slight, and that when they were exhausted she would be able to bring her back unresisting.

Nevertheless, she was conscious of a little tremor at the heart as they set forth.  There was an air of desperation about her companion that it was impossible to overlook.  Isabel’s manner towards her was so wholly devoid of that caressing element that had always marked their intimacy till that moment.  Without being actually frightened, she was very uneasy.  It was evident that Isabel was beyond all persuasion that day.

The sun was beginning to sink towards the western peaks as they turned up the white track, casting long shadows across the snow.  The pine-wood through which the road wound was mysteriously dark.  The rush of the stream in the hollow had an eerie sound.  It seemed to Dinah that the ground they trod was bewitched.  She almost expected to catch sight of goblin-faces peering from behind the dark trunks.  Now and then muffled in the snow, she thought she heard the scamper of tiny feet.