ould all see this tramp in his true light!

In three days Vivian had worked herself into a state from the eminence of
which she looked down with protecting pity upon Aunt Nan, the other
Vigilantes, and Mr. Hunter. They were being hoodwinked, and she alone was
left to guard their interests. Harrowing memories of tales she had read,
terrifying visions of escaped criminals whom she had witnessed in the
"movies," and who exactly resembled Mr. Crusoe, came to disturb her rest
and haunt her dreams. She was a quaking detective, watching Mr. Crusoe's
every act, and discovering treachery and evil design in the most innocent
of them.

On the fourth day following Mr. Crusoe's advent matters approached a
climax. In the early afternoon Mr. Hunter, driving to town on business,
had taken the other Vigilantes with him. Vivian, with letters to write,
had remained at home, feeling safe with Aunt Nan. In her stimulated
imagination Mr. Crusoe had been behaving peculiarly all the morning, and
not for worlds would she have stayed alone.

Hannah left soon after the others, going for raspberries up the canyon;
Aunt Nan, thoughtful and strangely silent, was in the living-room, where
within an hour she was joined by Malcolm Keith; Vivian sat beneath the
vines in the corner of the porch, and tried to center her attention upon a
letter she was writing to Dorothy. She was not eminently successful. Grave
apprehensions, strange forebodings, filled her heart. Once Mr. Crusoe
passed empty-handed before the porch. He did not see Vivian, although he
might easily have detected the beating of her heart. She watched him
pause, study for a brief moment the house, its doors and windows, and then
pass on. He was seizing the opportunity while they were all away, Vivian
told herself, to become better acquainted with his surroundings. Then some
day, not far distant, or some night, he----!

She jumped from her seat and ran indoors. At that moment she wanted
company more than anything else in the world. Sunny as it was outside,
the silence worried her. There was something portentous even in the
singing of the August insects. Aunt Nan's genuine interest in Mr. Crusoe
and his welfare would probably prevent Vivian from giving expression to
her new-born fears; but at least nearness to some one might quiet the
misgivings which were tormenting her.

She reached the living-room door, and stood still, unable to make her
presence known, and, for a moment, unable to run