she'll be pretty bad over it; but I guess we all will. It's
terribly sudden, somehow, though it's only what everybody half expected
would come; only we thought it would come from over yonder." He nodded
toward the west. "But she's got to stay here with us. Boarding at Sol
Tibbs's with that old man won't do; and she's no girl to live in two
rooms. You fix it up with her--you make her stay."

"She must," answered his daughter as she knelt beside him and patted his
coat and handed him several things to eat at the same time. "Mr. Fisbee
will help me persuade her, now that she's bound to stay in spite of him
and the Sherwoods, too. I think she is perfectly grand to do it. I've
always thought she was grand--ever since she took me under her wing
at school when I was terribly 'country' and frightened; but she was so
sweet and kind she made me forget. She was the pet of the school, too,
always doing things for the other girls, for everybody; looking out for
people simply heads and heads bigger than herself, and so
recklessly generous and so funny about it; and always thoughtful
and--and--pleasant----"

Minnie was speaking sadly, mechanically; but suddenly she broke off with
a quick sob, sprang up and went to the window; then, turning, cried out:

"I don't believe it! He knew how to take care of himself too well. He'd
have got away from them."

Her father shook his head. "Then why hasn't he turned up? He'd have gone
home after the storm if something bad wasn't the matter."

"But nothing--nothing _that_ bad could have happened. They haven't
found--any--anything."

"But why hasn't he come back, child?"

"Well, he's lying hurt somewhere, that's all."

"Then why haven't they found him?"

"I don't care!" she cried, and choked with the words and tossed her
dishevelled hair from her temples; "it isn't true. Helen won't believe
it--why should I? It's only a few hours since he was right here in our
yard, talking to us all. I won't believe it till they've searched every
stick and stone of Six-Cross-Roads and found him."

"It wasn't the Cross-Roads," said the old gentleman, pushing the table
away and relaxing his limbs on the sofa. "They probably didn't have
anything to do with it. We thought they had at first, but everybody's
about come to believe it was those two devils that he had arrested
yesterday."

"Not the Cross-Roads!" echoed Minnie, and she began to tremble
violently. "Haven't they been out there yet?"

"What use? T