ars as dem ar! O good Lord! good Lord!" the negro's voice
sank to a terrified whisper, "he's a-knockin' for me now!"

"It's a very gentle rap for the devil," said Mr. Villars, who could not
but be amused, notwithstanding the strange interruption of his purpose,
and Toby's vexatious obstinacy in holding the door. "It's some stranger;
let him in!"

"No, no, no!" gasped the negro. "I won't say nuffin, and you tell him I
ain't to home! Say I'se clar'd out, lef', gone you do'no' whar!"

"Toby!" was called from without.

"Dat's his voice! dat ar's his voice!" said Toby. And in his desperate
pushing, he pushed his feet from under him, and fell at full length
along the floor.

"It's the voice of Penn Hapgood!" exclaimed the old minister. "Arise,
quick, Toby, and open!"

Toby rubbed his head and looked bewildered.

"Are ye sartin ob dat, massa? Bress me, I breeve you're right, for
oncet! It _ar_ Mass' Penn's voice, shore enough!"

He opened the door, but started back again with another shriek,
convinced for an instant that it was, after all, the devil, who had
artfully borrowed Penn's voice to deceive him.

But no! It was Penn himself, his hat and clothes in his hand, smeared
with black tar and covered with feathers from head to foot; not even his
features spared, nor yet his hair; on his cheeks great clumps of gray
goose plumes, suggestive of diabolical ears, and with no other covering
but this to shield him from the night wind, save the emptied bed-tick,
which he had drawn over his shoulders, and which Toby had mistaken for
Satanic wings.

VI.

_A STRANGE COAT FOR A QUAKER._

Now, Virginia Villars was the very last person by whom Penn would have
wished to be seen. He was well aware how utterly grotesque and ludicrous
he must appear. But he was not in a condition to be very fastidious on
this point. Stunned by blows, stripped of his clothing (which could not
be put on again, for reasons), cruelly suffering from the violence done
him, exposed to the cold, excluded from Mrs. Sprowl's virtuous abode, he
had no choice but to seek the protection of those whom he believed to be
his truest friends.

In the little sitting-room of the blind old minister he had always been
gladly welcomed. Such minds as his were rare in Curryville. His purity
of thought, his Christian charity, his ardent love of justice, and
(quite as much as any thing) his delight in the free and friendly
discussion of principles, whether moral,