‘Yes,’ he said shortly.

The word gave her the faintest glimmering of hope, for she knew that Peter and I had lived at St Anton.  She tried to look out of the blurred window, but could see nothing except that the twilight was falling.  She begged for the road-map, and saw that so far as she could make out they were still in the broad Grunewald valley and that to reach St Anton they had to cross the low pass from the Staubthal.  The snow was still drifting thick and the car crawled.

Then she felt the rise as they mounted to the pass.  Here the going was bad, very different from the dry frost in which I had covered the same road the night before.  Moreover, there seemed to be curious obstacles.  Some careless wood-cart had dropped logs on the highway, and more than once both Ivery and the chauffeur had to get out to shift them.  In one place there had been a small landslide which left little room to pass, and Mary had to descend and cross on foot while the driver took the car over alone.  Ivery’s temper seemed to be souring.  To the girl’s relief he resumed the outside seat, where he was engaged in constant argument with the chauffeur.

At the head of the pass stands an inn, the comfortable hostelry of Herr Kronig, well known to all who clamber among the lesser peaks of the Staubthal.  There in the middle of the way stood a man with a lantern.

‘The road is blocked by a snowfall,’ he cried.  ’They are clearing it now.  It will be ready in half an hour’s time.’

Ivery sprang from his seat and darted into the hotel.  His business was to speed up the clearing party, and Herr Kronig himself accompanied him to the scene of the catastrophe.  Mary sat still, for she had suddenly become possessed of an idea.  She drove it from her as foolishness, but it kept returning.  Why had those tree-trunks been spilt on the road?  Why had an easy pass after a moderate snowfall been suddenly closed?

A man came out of the inn-yard and spoke to the chauffeur.  It seemed to be an offer of refreshment, for the latter left his seat and disappeared inside.  He was away for some time and returned shivering and grumbling at the weather, with the collar of his greatcoat turned up around his ears.  A lantern had been hung in the porch and as he passed Mary saw the man.  She had been watching the back of his head idly during the long drive, and had observed that it was of the round bullet type, with no nape to the neck, which is common in the Fatherland.  Now she could not see his neck for the coat collar, but she could have sworn that the head was a different shape.  The man seemed to suffer acutely from the cold, for he buttoned the collar round his chin and pulled his cap far over his brows.

Ivery came back, followed by a dragging line of men with spades and lanterns.  He flung himself into the front seat and nodded to the driver to start.  The man had his engine going already so as to lose no time.  He bumped over the rough debris of the snowfall and then fairly let the car hum.  Ivery was anxious for speed, but he did not want his neck broken and he yelled out to take care.  The driver nodded and slowed down, but presently he had got up speed again.