set in clay. The four bunks against the walls were filled, as the Squire had reported, with freshly gathered leaves. In the center of the room, upon which Amos and Judd were unloading the contents of the cart, was a roughly built table.
"'Twill not be long before we shall all be sleeping soundly," observed Mistress Condit brightly, noting with motherly eyes the pathetic little droop of Charity's mouth and the strained pallor of Mehitable. And soon, as s'e had promised, the girls were climbing gigglingly into their bunks, where they sank into the soft bearskin and buffalo robes Amos had spread over the leaves for them.
Amos and Judd rolled themselves in some blankets, and stoically lying down upon the earthen floor before the fire they had kindled, soon snored in loud duet. Mistress Condit and the Squire were also asleep in no time.
But for many minutes Charity's eyes gazed dreamily at the scene before her. The firelight rose and fell, sputtered and died away, causing the shadows of various articles upon the table to dance grotesquely upon the mud-plastered walls behind them. It was just as her tired eyelids were drooping sleepily for the last time that a slight noise at the unbarred door drove all slumber from her brain.
Tense alertness settled over her recumbent form, the sort of tension that can only come at night when one listens in the dark or the half dark. How glad she was that her bunk was in the shadows, with the firelight, which had flared up momentarily, throwing the door
