Page:Resurrection Rock (1920).pdf/97

 but its glow was ceasing to reassure her. From the room on the other side of the wall at her left she could hear sounds which told her that her grandfather was still restless; she heard him open his door and go out into the hall and come to her door and stand there. He was listening, she knew; but as her light was out and she sat quiet, he probably supposed her to be in bed and asleep. At any rate, after waiting a minute or two, he moved away and went downstairs.

She had taken off her boots before lying down and was wearing slippers; but she discarded even these and, in her stocking feet, moved noiselessly across to her door which she opened carefully. She crept halfway down the stairs and there waited for her grandfather, whom she could hear walking about, to come into her view. Something clicked; she recognized that he was loading a repeating rifle; and a few moments later his great figure came dimly into view when he halted before a window. She could see that he was holding his rifle ready but lowered; and her muscles went taut all through her. If he raised his rifle to fire, she would rush down upon him. But he did not; he only moved from one window to another, looking out; and then he came toward the stairs.

She regained her room without alarming him; and he went back to his room. On the Rock, the light had gone out. And being unable now to see anything but the stars and the snow and bare branches of the trees swaying slightly in the wind, Ethel opened her window to listen better. But no sound came to her except the brush of the breeze and, after some time, a call which she recognized as that of a snow owl. Then, close to midnight, she made out a man's figure moving under the trees; dogs floundered beside him—Lad and Lass