he interior, he directed
his steps to the garden, and getting over the low sod wall which
encircled it, began with the "know" of a connoisseur to look for the
tree which bore the best fruit.

This was soon found. Halting under a peach-tree he gathered the fruit
as he wanted it, breaking it open and scrutinising it carefully by what
little light the moon afforded; for the South African peach is not to be
eaten in the dark, its interior being as often as not a mass of
squirming maggots; and of it holds good the same as of some human
beings--the more immaculately perfect the exterior, the greater the
settled corruption within. However, the light was moderately sufficient
for such requisite discrimination, and soon he had made a most luscious
and acceptable feed.

This done, he returned to the house and carefully tested all the
shutters. They were made of strong slabs, and held firm. But there was
one small window at the back which was not shuttered, only protected by
a board, fitting to the window-frame. This Roden wrenched away in a
trice, and seeing that there was no other way of doing it, proceeded
cautiously to break a pane of glass.

Heavens! what a clatter and jingle it made in the stillness of the
night--the shower of glass falling upon the stone window-sill, and into
the room! Then, carefully inserting his hand, Roden was able to pull
back the bolt, and in another moment was in the house.

"Well, this is my first burglary, anyhow," he said grimly to himself, as
striking a match he began to survey the surroundings.

Frontier farmhouses are all built pretty much on the same plan, and
almost invariably one-storeyed. Roden saw at a glance he was in the
kitchen, but it and the living rooms were equally dismantled. The
owners of the place, whoever they were, had evidently not trekked in a
panic, but in leisurely fashion enough to have taken away with them
pretty nearly all that could be taken.

There is always something more or less ghostly about the interior of an
empty house at night time. As Roden went from room to room, exploring
by the feeble light of a flickering wax vesta, it seemed that in the
dark corners lurked the shadows of the former occupants, watching, with
resentful and menacing stare, this burglarious intruder. The planks,
creaking beneath his footfall, raised loud and unearthly sounds in the
hollow silence, and once in the semi-gloom, the swaying of an old
blanket, hung overhead on a li