-whites, that Marcia Lowe heard a knock upon her cabin
door. So alone and absorbed had she been for the past few days that a
demand from the outer world startled and annoyed her. Martin was
sleeping--he lay in the lean-to chamber--so on tiptoe the little doctor
went to answer the summons.

The storm had passed unnoticed by Marcia Lowe, and a bright starry
heaven lay behind the tall figure of Tod Greeley on the doorstep.

"Oh! Come in, come in!" whispered Marcia--and oddly enough she felt a
glow of relief and welcome. Greeley came in and grimly took a chair by
the cheerful fire on the ashless hearth.

"I've come on a mighty unpleasant errand, ma'am," he said; "and I ain't
one as can pass around sweets before the bitters."

All the way to Trouble Neck Greeley had arranged this speech, and the
medical flavour of it had given him courage.

"You're very kind to come yourself, Mr. Greeley," Marcia Lowe was
smiling; "another might not have been so welcome. And now for the
bitter! I'll gulp it bravely, for I like sweets better."

She sat down in her own rough little rocker, and swayed calmly to and
fro.

"Well, mum, the County Club, in session down to the store, delegated me
to call on you. Leastway, I done told them I reckoned no one else
_but_ me should come first!"

"Thank you again, Mr. Greeley."

"Since the raid on Teale's----" Tod drawled uncomfortably--"there's
them as is scared. I ain't standing up or setting down for them Speak
Easies back o' The Hollow, but business is business, and no man knows
who's going to get struck so long as----" Greeley glanced cautiously
about--"so long as--you're hiding what you _are_ hiding!"

For a moment Marcia Lowe tried to readjust her thoughts and get them
into some sort of connection; finally she laughed, laughed so long and
so noiselessly that Greeley grew nervous.

"Lord, ma'am!" he faltered, "you can't afford to take it that-er-way
lest you've got your place _full_ of 'em!"

"Oh! Mr. Greeley. They think, the club thinks I have something to do
with the raid? Why I did not know, until some one told me, that there
had been one. Come, I want you to see what I am hiding!"

She motioned her guest to the doorway of the lean-to.

"Look!" she whispered.

For a moment Greeley did not recognize the wan, helpless creature
huddled on the bed; so small, so pitiful was the unconscious man that
he seemed a stranger. Then in amaze and half terror, Tod breathed:

"M