All voices mingled in that cry--voices of hope, of agony, and of despair; but she could not interpret them.

Something told her that the interpretation and the issue were in the mind of God alone.
Perhaps she swooned, perhaps she slept and dreamed this dream; perhaps the sharp rushing air overcame her.

At the least Lysbeth's eyes closed and her mind gave way.

When they opened and it returned again their sledge was rushing past the winning post.

But in front of it travelled another sledge, drawn by a gaunt grey horse, which galloped so hard that its belly seemed to lie upon the ice, a horse driven by a young man whose face was set like steel and whose lips were as the lips of a trap.
Could that be the face of her cousin Pieter van de Werff, and, if so, what passion had stamped that strange seal thereon?
She turned herself in her seat and looked at him who drove her.
Was this a man, or was it a spirit escaped from doom?
Blessed Mother of Christ! what a countenance! The eyeballs starting and upturned, nothing but the white of them to be seen; the lips curled, and, between, two lines of shining fangs; the lifted points of the mustachios touching the high cheekbones.