A Romance of Wastdale

ashed from stone to stone, rose to his ears, and there seemed to him something strangely sweet and peaceful in the sound. He advanced to its edge and washed carefully in the stream

nd after it, a parcel. For a moment he wondered what that was, and then remembered that he had forgo

ts of glass, the presence of Hawke's own knife open by the side of the body, and even the scarf about his arm, which hung loose and clumsily after the ice-axe had been removed, would all point to the one conclusion-- that the wound was an accident and self-inflicted.

ken from Hawke. Then he fastened the bundle securely about the biggest stone he could find and hurled it far out into the Lake. It sank with a loud splash, and Gordon looked quickly round thinking that some one must have noticed it. The only sound that he heard, however, was the wash of the ripples on the bank, and he turned and made hastily up the valley, across the fields, until h

after all," said he. "Has

Haw

ect, to come up to dinner this evening. I ought to have told you, but

ponsibility for the dinner, and

aid Gordon. "Bring the dinner

nge your

said, with a laugh. "You might lay another

him a place was laid for the ma

mself for that; and besides, the look with which Hawke had returned it somehow remained fixed in his mind. Striv

ger. They had not imagined anything amiss before, as they unde

llar," Gordon said, "and he wen

t later than one in the afternoon by the church in the

er to examine the cliffs of Scafell. Gordon elected to join the former, and they sepa

hese mountains, stone dead," said o

en, that Gordon found himself in the end hu

again. A man was running towards them with the news that the body had been found, and he led them up to the cliffs on Scafell. Gordon stood by Hawke's side for a mom

m down," he said.

bore it down to the village. On the way they passed the glissade on the side of the mounta

ll never come down that

disappeared round a headland, and t

gully, and far down he could see the quiet waters of the Lake lapping the base of it. He cast one look towards Wastdale. Eastwards the sun was ris

*

the gully, caught by a boulder on the water's edge. One hand was

itain. Hazell, Watson & Vine