was always delighted to go. His love for his own ancestry made him
admire and respect that of others; so that Stephen's enthusiasm in
the matter was but another cord to bind him to her.

In one of their excursions they found the door into the crypt open;
and nothing would do Stephen but that they should enter it. To-day,
however, they had no light; but they arranged that on the morrow they
would bring candles with them and explore the place thoroughly. The
afternoon of the next day saw them at the door of the crypt with a
candle, which Harold proceeded to light. Stephen looked on
admiringly, and said in a half-conscious way, the half-consciousness
being shown in the implication:

'You are not afraid of the crypt?'

'Not a bit! In my father's church there was a crypt, and I was in it
several times.' As he spoke the memory of the last time he had been
there swept over him. He seemed to see again the many lights, held
in hands that were never still, making a grim gloom where the black
shadows were not; to hear again the stamp and hurried shuffle of the
many feet, as the great oak coffin was borne by the struggling mass
of men down the steep stairway and in through the narrow door . . .
And then the hush when voices faded away; and the silence seemed a
real thing, as for a while he stood alone close to the dead father
who had been all in all to him. And once again he seemed to feel the
recall to the living world of sorrow and of light, when his inert
hand was taken in the strong loving one of Squire Norman.

He paused and drew back.