Abruptly the music fell; there came a long slow-growing silence; and
then, with a flutter, she was beside him again, laughing in his ears and
crying with mocking voice:

"Is you afeared, honey?"

He saw in her eyes sweet yearnings, but could speak nothing. He could
only clasp her hand tightly, and again down they raced through the wood.

All at once the swamp changed and chilled to a dull grayness; tall,
dull trees started down upon the murky waters; and long pendent
streamings of moss-like tears dripped from tree to earth. Slowly and
warily they threaded their way.

"Are you sure of the path, Zora?" he once inquired anxiously.

"I could find it asleep," she answered, skipping sure-footed onward. He
continued to hold her hand tightly, and his own pace never slackened.
Around them the gray and death-like wilderness darkened. They felt and
saw the cold white mist rising slowly from the ground, and waters
growing blacker and broader.

At last they came to what seemed the end. Silently and dismally the
half-dead forest, with its ghostly moss, lowered and darkened, and the
black waters spread into a great silent lake of slimy ooze. The dead
trunk of a fallen tree lay straight in front, torn and twisted, its top
hidden yonder and mingled with impenetrable undergrowth.

"Where now, Zora?" he cried.