“The horses are not here. They are at Brother Wright’s if anywhere.”
“Can you find the way in the dark? Then come all the same.”
He held her hand. Was it for fear lest she should turn back, or was it for some other reason? They walked in silence towards the Wrights’ house, two dark shadows stealing through the blackness.
“Mr. Cotterell,” whispered Olive with chattering teeth. “If anyone should come out of the house on account of the noise, don’t fire. We are all non-resistants, you know, here, and he won’t have a pistol.” Olive had no knowledge of the plenary indulgence which Brother Wright had seen fit to bestow upon himself in this matter.
“Dear heart! don’t fear,” said Cotterell tenderly. “I am a desperate man flying for his life, it is true, but I am not a dastard. No human being at Perfection City shall ever be hurt by my hand. They are all sacred to me for your sweet sake. Ah yes, how truly it is Perfection City, none but I really know.”
They walked on again in silence.
“Is there a dog?”
“Yes, but he knows me well. We are coming to the back of the stable now.”
“Then go and speak to the dog through the chinks of the logs, else he will bark at me.”
Olive crept up quietly, and putting her lips to a crevice in the rough log-stable said softly, “Pluto, good dog!” Pluto answered with a whine of satisfaction, and a soft, purring trumpet from Queen Katharine announced that she too was within, and that she recognised her mistress’s voice.