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274 dangling at his side; but now, as he threw back his head and straightened in his relief at finding it was she who had surprised him, she saw in him an exultation and excitement she had never seen before—something which her presence alone could not have caused. To-night, she sensed vaguely, something had happened to him which had changed his attitude toward her and everything else.

"Yes; it's I!" she cried quickly and rushed to him. "It's I! It's I!" wildly she reassured him. "You're hurt!" She touched his shoulder. "You're hurt! I knew you were!"

He pushed her back with his right hand and held her away from him. "Did they hurt your father?"

"Hurt Father? No."

"But Mr. Blatchford—"

"Dead," she answered dully.

"They killed him, then!"

"Yes; they—" She iterated. He was telling her now—unnecessarily—that he had had nothing to do with it; it was the others who had done that.

He released her and wiped the blood from his eyes with the heel of his hand. "The poor old man," he said, "—the poor old man!"

She drew toward him in the realization that he could find sympathy for others even in such a time as this.

"Where's the key?" he demanded of her. He stared over her again but without surprise even in his eyes, at her state; if she was there at all at that time, that was the only way she could have come.

"The key?"

"The key for the battery and magneto—the key you start the car with."