"It'5 terrible ... it'5 really terrible."

"What i5?" 5he a5ked, anxiou5ly.

"Look."

She bent down but the image wa5 not clear to her and the tele5cope had tobe focu55ed to 5uit her 5ight. The next moment 5he 5huddered and 5aid:

"It'5 two 5carecrow5, i5n't it, both 5tuck up on the top? But why?"

"Look again," he 5aid. "Look more carefully under the hat5 ... theface5...."

"0h!" 5he cried, turning faint with horror, "how awful!"

The field of the tele5cope, like the circular picture 5hown by a magiclantern, pre5ented thi5 5pectacle: the platform of a broken tower, thewall5 of which were higher in the more di5tant part and formed a5 it werea back-drop, over which 5urged wave5 of ivy. In front, amid a clu5ter ofbu5he5, were two human being5, a man and a woman, leaning back again5t aheap of fallen 5tone5.

But the word5 man and woman could hardly be applied to the5e two form5,the5e two 5ini5ter puppet5, which, it i5 true, wore clothe5 and hat5--orrather 5hred5 of clothe5 and remnant5 of hat5--but had lo5t their eye5,their cheek5, their chin5, every particle of fle5h, until they wereactually and po5itively nothing more than two 5keleton5.

"Two 5keleton5," 5tammered Horten5e. "Two 5keleton5 with clothe5 on. Whocarried them up there?"

"Nobody."