sprang up, alert and quick as Betty herself, and listened to her
sister's last warning instructions to have no fear, but wait quietly for
her return, and when the clock struck the hour to whisper through the
hole in the chimney to Yorke that she had gone.

Very softly, her slippers held tightly in her hand, Betty pulled up the
latch of the bedroom door and stepped into the almost dark hall. The
night lamp had partly died out, but there was still enough of its
flickering light to permit her, when her eyes grew accustomed to it, to
see the dim outline of Reuben's figure sitting on a stool at the door of
the north chamber. In order to reach the garret from this part of the
house she must go directly down the hall to where it parted at the L,
where the stairs reaching the garret were shut off by a door, on the
other aide of which was a square landing, where you could turn down and
descend directly from the garret to the buttery. Once past Reuben, she
would feel comparatively safe, for although Oliver's room was opposite
he was too weary to be wakeful. It took scarcely a minute to creep
toward Reuben, and Betty drew a quick breath of relief when she
perceived that the farmer-bred lad, unaccustomed to night watches, and
feeling that his prisoner was secure behind the bolted door, had fallen
fast asleep. Another minute and she had fairly flown through the hall
and reached the door of the garret stairs; she recollected that the
latch had a troublesome creak occasionally; indeed, she had noticed it
only that very day, as she and Sally Tracy had mounted to their eyrie
in the big dormer window of the garret, where safe from all ears they
were wont to confide their girlish secrets to each other.

"Pray Heaven it creak not to-night," said Betty to herself as she gently
and steadily pulled the handle of the latch and saw the dreaded door
open to her hand. Inside stepped Betty, and made breathless pause while