The Park had a certain beauty of its own, it was big and, if its undulations were insignificant, their curves were soft and full, and the timber was magnificent and well-placed; the whole looked well under snow. The great dull red-brick house stood out in fine contrast to the dazzling white of the earth, and the glittering green of the clump of pines that flanked its left wing, and from which the fierce wind kept stripping the snow wreaths, that tried hard to nestle in the shelter of the cosy branches. When Gwen got beyond the terraces to a turn in the drive, she could see the sluggish stream that ran through a mile or so of the Park, turned into a torrent, rushing and foaming onward in its brilliant course. She stopped in the very teeth of the storm, and looked round her with a radiant face. “The whole place is transformed!” she thought. “It generally reminds me of a great soft white cow, chewing the cud knee-deep in water in the shade of a full silky beech, it has all that beast’s ample, contented, intolerably depressing beauty; but to-day it is grand, glorious, like anything but a cow, the heart of it is alive and throbbing under that driving storm, it is the birth of passion in that suave smooth green sod, and the snow is the christening robe. Oh, I wish it were always like this!” She threw off her veil and turned round, that the blast might strike every part of her. “It’s magnificent!” she shouted in her excitement, “and—after all, passion’s a wonderful thing!” She laughed as she bent to the blast. “But it’s amazing the way it subsides without leaving a token of its presence—what’s a broken bough or two as a witness to these wonders? In two days, in less, this place will be as uncompromisingly smooth and smug as ever. Ah, passion is a fraud then, or else it requires explanation!” She hurried on to the little ivy-covered bridge that spanned the stream, and looked down into the roaring seething waters with laughing parted lips. She wanted to stay, the hurrying foaming mass of unrest had a fascination for her, but she dragged herself from it and turned off from the drive on to a narrow path that led to a sheltered wooded glade about half a mile from the gates. “I see the deer and the sheep have taken refuge there!” she said to herself, “I suppose the fury of the storm goes over their heads. I can think of nothing I ought to here, I shall follow the deer. Bran, what do you mean to do?” She pointed significantly to the antlers peeping through the snow-laden branches. The hound gave a solemn nod. Seemingly he understood her, at any rate he kept by her side and refrained from sport for that afternoon. When she got to the trees she looked round for a seat. The snow on the ground was too soft for sitting purposes, even for her reckless strength to venture on, but she found at last safe anchorage on a broad wooden fence that skirted the grove, then she turned all her senses in on herself.