I's you, till you've been over it
yourself."

Raven, with a nod of understanding, took the book, put it into his desk
drawer and turned the key, and Charlotte hurried away to her kitchen.
When he went downstairs again, he found Amelia at the open door. She was
all an excitement of anticipation.

"Law, Milly," said he, in the country phrasing he loved to use to her
when she was most securely on her high horse of the cultured life, "you
look as nervous as a witch."

"Where is it?" said Amelia, beating a tattoo of impatience, with one
hand, on the door. "You've been up attic, haven't you?"

"Bless you, no," said Raven. "I can't go up attic now. I've got to do an
errand for Charlotte." This was true. Nan's dinner had to be carried
over. "You run up, there's a good girl. Give you something to do. No!
no!" She was turning toward the kitchen. "Don't you go bothering
Charlotte. I won't have it. Cut along."

And Amelia did, in a dignified haste, to show him how journals were
found, and later, when the moment came, Raven went with his hot hamper
to Nan's.

She met him at the door, no such overflowing Nan as last night, but
serenely practical and quite settled into the accustomed comforts of her
house.

"I'm as hungry as a bear," said she. "Come through to the kitchen. I eat
in there. The only drawback to this, Rookie, is that it takes it out of
Charlotte. Still, it won't last long, and I'll give her a kiss and a
blue charmeuse. That would pay anybody for anything."

They unpacked the basket together, and Nan, her plate and knife and fork
ready on a napkin, began to eat. Raven sat down at the other end of the
table.

"I wish you'd stay," he said, watching her in her pretty haste. "I don't
mean here: over with me. Come on, Nan. Amelia's settled down for good.
She won't bother you--much. Anyhow, you can run off up to the hut."

Then he remembered what other fugitive she might find at the hut, and
saw she, too, remembered. Her words came pat upon it.

"The Tenneys are going to have a prayer-meeting Wednesday night."

"A prayer-meeting!" He heard himself echoing it incredulously.

"Yes, and you're to take me, Rookie. Don't scowl. I've got to see that
man when he worships his idols, and you've got to see him, too. His god
must be an idol: burnt offerings, that sort of thing. Perhaps that's
what he's doing it all for: offering her up, as a kind of sacrifice. His
wife, I mean. What's her name, Rookie?"

"Thyatira," sai