Page:Mistress Madcap (1937).pdf/27

 to the listeners' ears. Silence reigned except for the gale.

"Nothing there, Samuel?" queried Mistress Condit tremblingly, at last.

From behind her voluminous skirts peered the frightened faces of the girls. Strange, dark war-times these were, when they never could be sure whether it was friend or foe or wild animal approaching!

"No one there, Father?" repeated Charity's sweet voice anxiously.

"Nay, I think not!" shouted back the Squire, moving forward to the edge of the doorstep, where he stood peering through the curtain of rain and sleet that beat upon him. "No one hereStay! What is that out by yon tree!"

And without another word, unarmed, he plunged off the doorstep to disappear into the teeth of the storm!