We’d got the horses in. I lifted her up on to the saddle, and she rode out. Her horse was all on the square, so there was no harm in her taking him back with her, and off we went. Dad didn’t go after all. We took it easy out to the old stockyard. We meant to camp there for half-an-hour, and then to send her on, with Warrigal to keep with her and show her the way home.

We didn’t want to make the time too short. What a lovely day it was! The mountain sides were clogged up with mist for an hour after we started; still, anyone that knew the climate would have said it was going to be a fine day. There wasn’t a breath of air; every thing was that still that not a leaf on any of the trees so much as stirred.

When we came to the pass out of the valley, we none of us got off; it was better going up than coming down, and it would have tired Aileen out at the start to walk up. So the horses had to do their climbing. It didn’t matter much to them. We were all used to it, horses and riders. Jim and I went first, then Warrigal, then Aileen and Starlight. After we got up to the top we all stopped and halted a bit to look round.

Just then, as if he’d waited for us, the sun came out from behind the mountain; the mists lifted and rolled away as if they had been gray curtains. Everything showed clear out like a playhouse, the same Jim and I used to see in Melbourne. From where we stood you could see everything, the green valley flats with the big old trees in clumps, some of ‘em just the same as they’d been planted. The two little river-like silver threads winding away among the trees, and far on the opposite side the tall gray rock towers shining among the forest edges of the high green wall. Somehow the sun wasn’t risen enough to light up the mountain. It looked as black and dismal as if it was nightfall coming on.

“Good-bye, old Hollow!” Aileen called out, waving her hand. “Everything looks bright and beautiful except the mountain. How gloomy it appears, as if it held some dreadful secret—doesn’t it? Ah! what a pleasant time it has been for me. Am I the same Aileen Marston that went in there a few weeks since? And now I suppose there will be more misery and anxiety waiting for all of us when I get back. Well, come what will, I have had a little happiness on this earth. In heaven there must be rest.”