e _he_ comes back," he muttered.

"Ah!" mutely rejoiced the Dean Man, "I'm making you think about _him_ at
last! I'll succeed in getting your mind to connect him with Anne Marie
by the time the others----"

"'Uncle Rat has gone to town! Ha.-_H'M!_'"

chanted Willem under his breath as his fingers moved from part to part
of the nearly completed picture. "'_To buy his niece a wedding
gown._'--There's her hand!" he interrupted himself as an elusive scrap
of the photograph was at last discovered and put into place.

Peter Grimm's eyes were fixed on the door of Kathrien's room in a
compelling stare.

"Her other hand!" mused Willem. "'_What shall the wedding breakfast be?
Ha-H'M! What shall the----?_' Where's--here's the last two parts. There!
It's _done_! Oh, Anne Marie! Mamma! I----"

The door of Kathrien's room opened. The girl, under a spell of the Dead
Man's will, came out to the banisters.

CHAPTER XVI

THE "SENSITIVE"

Kathrien, looking down into the firelit room, saw the white-clad boy
starting up in triumph with his work.

"Why, Willem!" she cried, dumfounded at sight of the invalid out of bed
at such an hour. "What are you doing down there? You ought to----"

"Oh, Miss Kathrien!" exclaimed the child, pointing toward the picture.
"Come down, quick!"

"You mustn't get out of bed like this when you're ill," gently reproved
Kathrien. "I had a feeling that you weren't in your room. That is why I
came out to look. Come----"

"But, look!" insisted Willem, pointing again at the picture puzzle he
had so painstakingly pieced together. "Look, Miss Kathrien!"

"Come, dear!" admonished Kathrien. "You must not play down there. Wait a
minute, and I'll make your bed again. It will be more comfortable for
you if it's made over. Then you must come right upstairs."

She went to the sick room and set to work with deft speed rearranging
the tumbled sheets and smoothing the rumpled pillows. Willem looked down
at his disregarded picture and his lip trembled. He gazed about the room
in the hope of seeing Peter Grimm. He strained his keen ears for sound
of the Dead Man's gentle, comforting voice.

But Peter Grimm was looking fixedly toward the dining-room door. And in
a moment it opened and Mrs. Batholommey bustled in.

"I thought I heard some one call," observed the rector's wife for the
benefit of any one who might be in the half-lighted room.

Then, as her eyes grew accustomed to the gloom, she espied Will