Page:More lives than one.djvu/51



Dickson sighed. He was up against a hard case, and the odds were against him. His men were searching high and low for the man of the house, and for his servant. He didn’t believe that Locke had merely gone to escort a guest home. If he were the right sort of a man he would have sent some one with her and remained himself at his own home.

Hutchins agreed to this, and leaving the room by the back way he began a search himself.

As he closed the door behind him, his quick ears caught a stifled sob.

It seemed to come from a closed closet, and, throwing opened the door and, striking a match, simultaneously, he discovered some one huddled among a lot of canvases and artists’ odds and ends.

“Come out! Who are you?” he ordered, sharply, but changed his tone as he clutched at the arm of a trembling girl.

“Oh,” she sobbed, “oh, what shall I do?”

“Do, miss? Why, just come out, and tell me who you are. Don’t be afraid of me—if you’ve nothing else to be afraid of! What’s your name?”

“I’m Miss Cutler,” and, somehow, meeting this crisis seemed to give her back her nerve. “I was—I was frightened—so—so I hid.”

“I see you did,” Hutchins remarked, dryly, his own sympathy for her waning, as she recovered her poise. “Why did you do it?”

“Do what?”

“Hide—of course. You didn’t do anything else—did you? Nothing wrong, now?”

“No, of course I didn’t!” she began gravely, but broke down again and sobbed.

“May I go home? Oh, please let me go home.”