"Get out," said Agatha. "I'll shoot if you stop."

He climbed quietly over the ledge, his lantern flickered and went out,
and next moment Agatha saw nothing but the driving snow. Then she closed
the window and fastened the shutter in frantic haste, and afterwards
leaned against the wall, trembling and breathing hard. Still the man had
gone and she thought he would not come back. Pulling herself together
she returned to her room.

Although she had driven the man away, she locked the door, and when she
had lighted the lamp sat down to recover her calm. There was no use in
wakening Mrs. Farnam, and by and by she began to look about. The papers
in the writing-table had been thrown upon the floor; her trunk was empty
and the clothes it had held were scattered. The man had obviously been
searching for something, and this was curious, because one would not
expect to find jewelry in a writing-table, and a bureau with three or
four drawers had not been opened. Then she noticed her father's letters
lying in a bundle on the table, and put them back in the trunk from
which she had recently taken them. After this, she re-packed her
clothes, and sitting down again tried to remember all that had happened.

There was something puzzling about the adventure. To begin with, she
could not see why the man had come to her room and what he expected to
get. A clever thief would have gone to Farnam's office. Then she thought
he was not a coward; he had given way because he was cool enough to see
that he was in her power and resistance would lead to his getting shot.
Yet he had seemed to shrink when he heard her voice. She reflected with
faint amusement that her voice was not harsh, and she had studied its
control as part of her training when she began to teach. The little
tricks of tone and gesture one used to overawe young girls would not