tell
the police.

Normally she would have told Kate about Hank Brown, would have asked
Kate's advice, for Kate was practical when she forgot herself long
enough to be perfectly natural. But she and Kate were speaking only
when it was absolutely necessary to speak, and discussion was
therefore out of the question. She felt penned up, miserable. What if
Hank Brown found out about Jack and set the sheriff on his trail? He
would, she believed, if he knew--for he hated Jack because of that
fight. Jack had told her about it, keeping the cause fogged in
generalities.

All that night the wind howled up the mountainside and ranted through
the forest so that Marion could not sleep. Twice she heard a tree go
splitting down through the outstretched arms of its close neighbors,
to fall with a crash that quivered the cabin. She was glad that Jack's
camp was in a cave. She would have been terribly worried if he had to
stay out where a tree might fall upon him. She pictured the horror of
being abroad in the forest with the dark and that raging wind. She
hoped that the morning would bring calm, because she wanted to see
Jack again and take him some magazines, and tell him about Hank.

In the morning it was snowing and raining by turns, with gusty blasts
of wind. Marion looked out, even opened the door and stood upon the
step; but the storm dismayed her so that she gave up the thought of
going, until a chance sentence overheard while she was making the
professor's bed in the little lean-to changed her plan of waiting into
one of swift action. She heard Douglas say to Kate that, if Fred did
decide to inform the chief of police, they should be hearing something
very soon now. With the trial probably started, they would certainly
waste no time. They would wire up to the sheriff here.

"Oh, I wish you hadn't told Fred," Kate began to expostulate, when
Marion burst in upon them furiously.

"You told, did you?" she accused Kate tempestuously. "Doug, of all
people! You knew the little runt couldn't keep his hands off--you knew
he'd be so darned righteous he'd make all the trouble he could for
other people, because he hasn't got nerve enough to do anything wrong
himself. You couldn't keep it to yourself, for all your promises and
your crocodile tears! I ought to have known better than trust you with
anything. But I'll tell you one thing more, you two nasty nice
creatures that are worse than scrawling snakes--I'll tell you this: It
won't d