other emotion far less difficult to understand began to stir
within him as he sat motionless for a time scanning the shapeless bulk
of the place, entirely dark save for a single light in the rear room.
For the first time he saw how utterly apart from the rest of the town
those unpainted old farm buildings were--how utterly isolated. The
twinkling lights of the village were mere pin-points in the distance.
Each thick shadow beneath the eaves of the house was blacker than he
had ever noticed before. Even the soft swish of the rain as it seeped
from the sodden shingles, even the very familiar complaint of loose
nails lifted by the wind under the clapboards, set his heart pumping
faster. All in an instant his sensation-hungry old brain seized upon
each detail that was as old as he himself and manufactured, right
there on the spot, a sinister something--a something of unaccountable
dread, which sent a delightful shiver up and down his thin, bony, old
back.

For a while he waited and debated with himself, not at all certain
now that he was as keen for a solution of the riddle of that cut
which had adorned Young Denny's chin as he had been. And yet, even
while he hesitated, feeding his imagination upon the choicest of
premonitory tit-bits, he knew he meant to go ahead. He was magnifying
the unfathomed peril that existed in his erratic, hair-trigger old
brain alone merely for the sake of the complacent pride which
resulted therefrom--pride in the contemplation of his own intrepid
dare-deviltry.

He could scarcely have put into words just what reception he had
imagined was awaiting him; but, whatever it might have been, Young
Denny's greeting was full as startling. A worn, dusty, shapeless
leather bag stood agape upon the table before the window, and Denny
Bolton paused over the half-folded garment in his hands to wheel
sharply toward the newcomer as the door creaked open.

For one uncomfortable moment the old adventurer waited in vain for any
light of welcome, or even recognition, to flash up in the boy's steady
scrutiny. Then the vaguest of smiles began to twitch at the corners of
Denny's lips. He laid the coat back upon the table and stepped forward
a pace.

"Hello!--Here at last, are you?" he saluted. "Aren't you pretty late
tonight?"

Old Jerry swallowed hard at the cheery ease of the words, but his
fluttery heart began to pump even faster than when he had sat outside
in the buggy debating the advisability of his fur