ened the stable door, and, just as if
nothing had happened, the mare moved to her place. He was going to
take off the saddle and undo the reins, but I stopped him. There was a
great fear at my heart, for which after all there did not seem to be
any very definite cause.

Father might have gone up to his room without awaking anybody. The
great door of the yard was locked. Some one, therefore, must have
unlocked it, let in Dapple, and relocked it. Who but my father could
have done this? At worst he had met with some accident, and was even
then dressing a wound or reposing himself.

That is what we said, the one to the other. But I am quite sure that
neither of us believed it, even as the words were leaving our mouths.

Then we heard something that made us both jump--the voice of my mother.
She was speaking down from her window. I could see the white frill of
her cap.

"Father," she called out in a voice in which she never spoke to me.
"Is that you?"

Then in quite another tone, "Who has left the stable door open?"

"Me, mistress--and Joe!" said Bob.

"Then there is something wrong! I am coming down."

And the next moment we could hear her, for she had never undressed,
descending the stairway.

"What shall we do--quick--what shall we say?"

Bob Kingsman was never very quick at invention.

"Tell her 'an accident,'" I whispered, "we are going to look for
him--say nothing about the yard door having been opened and shut again."

For even then I felt that the key of the mystery lay there.

My mother took it more quietly than we had hoped. She did not cry out,
but to this day I mind the tremulous light of the candle which she
carried in one shaking hand and sheltered with the other. It went
quavering from her breast to her face, and then down again till it
mixed with the steady shine of the stable lantern in Bob's hand.

She went into the stable and looked Dapple over carefully, without,
however, attempting to touch anything about the mare's trappings.

"There will hae been an accident," she faltered, her tongue almost
refusing its office, "your faither must have been thrown! We will all
go and seek for him. We will waken the village."

"But you are not fit, mother. Bide here quiet in the house--let others
seek--you are never fit."

"Who has my right?" she said, with a suppressed fierceness, very
strange in one so kindly. "I will go out and seek for my man! No one
shall hinder me!"

CH