Inside the wall the white covering lay deep. Bower's prominent eyes, searching everywhere with furtive horror, saw that a little space had been cleared in one corner. The piled up snow was strewed with broken weeds and tufts of long grass. It bore an uncanny resemblance to the edges of a grave. He paused, irresolute, unnerved, yet desperately determined to fall in with Stampa's strange mood. "There is nothing to fear," said the old man gently. "They brought her here. You are not afraid--you, who clasped her to your breast, and swore you loved her?" Bower's face, deathly pale before, flamed into sudden life. The strain was unbearable. He could feel his own heart beating violently. "What do you want me to do?" he almost shouted. "She is dead! My repentance is of no avail! Why are you torturing me in this manner?" "Softly, son-in-law, softly! You are disturbed, or you would see the hand of Providence in our meeting. What could be better arranged? You have returned after all these years. It is not too late. To-day you shall marry Etta!" Bower's neck was purple above the line of his white collar. The veins stood out on his temples. He looked like one in the throes of apoplexy. "For Heaven's sake! what do you mean?" he panted. "I mean just what I say. This is your wedding day. Your bride lies there, waiting. Never did woman wait for her man so still and patient." "Come away, Stampa! This thing must be dealt with reasonably. Come away! Let us find some less mournful place, and I shall tell you----" "Nay, even yet you do not understand. Well, then, Marcus Bauer, hear me while you may. I swear you shall marry my girl, if I have to recite the wedding prayers over your dead body. I have petitioned the Madonna to spare me from becoming a murderer, and I give you this last chance of saving your dirty life. Kneel there, by the side of the grave, and attend to the words that I shall read to you, or you must surely die! You came to Zermatt and chose my Etta. Very well, if it be God's will that she should be the wife of a scoundrel like you, it is not for me to resist. Marry her you shall, here and now! I will bind you to her henceforth and for all eternity, and the time will come when her intercession may drag you back from the hell your cruel deed deserves." With a mighty effort, Bower regained the self-conceit that Stampa's words, no less than the depressing environment, had shocked out of him. The grotesque nature of the proposal was a tonic in itself. "If I had expected any such folly on your part, I should not have come with you," he said, speaking with something of his habitual dignity. "Your suggestion is monstrous. How can I marry a dead woman?" Stampa's expression changed instantly. Its meek sorrow yielded to a ferocity that was appalling. Already bent, he crouched like a wild beast gathering itself for an attack. "Do you refuse?" he asked, in a low note of intense passion.