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 upon the gray, cracked counter; Barney caught her elbow and gave her a lift up on the counter, where she sat while he stood in the snow nearer the window and looked back toward her grandfather's house. No one had followed them; no one appeared to be taking any further interest in them.

"You saw Kincheloe this morning?" Ethel asked.

"I heard some one speak to him; he was in the house, but I did not see him," Barney said.

"He would keep out of sight now," she said and, as briefly as possible, she told Barney what followed her arrival at St. Florentin and of her grandfather's attempt to bribe her to tell about him, of Kincheloe's absence during the afternoon and evening and of the peculiar events of the night; she told of her visit to the Rock with Asa Redbird and their discoveries; and she received in return full report from Barney.

He had stopped at Wheedon's in the afternoon, as Ethel had supposed, and there had learned that the man named Bagley, who had never been seen in the neighborhood before, had arrived a day earlier and exhibited a letter from Marcellus Clarke which authorized him to obtain the keys to the house on Resurrection Rock. Wheedon had furnished him with the keys and, at Bagley's request, Wheedon and his wife had accompanied Bagley to the Rock where they had opened the house. The Wheedons then had returned, apparently after filling Bagley with the neighborhood gossip and superstition about Resurrection Rock.

Bagley stayed at the house, having brought a supply of food; he built fires and had everything ready when Barney arrived. He proved to be a steward sort of person—a man about forty-five, accustomed to obey orders without inquiring into reasons. He did things