She fumbled for the chair, and found it empty. She reached for the belt and holster which he usually hung on a hook at the head of the bed. They, too, were gone, and Frances felt relieved.
She did not withdraw from the room through either of the long windows. Instead, she crept through her father’s office and out of the door of that room into the great, main hall.
Along this a little way was the door of the room to which Pratt Sanderson had been assigned, and that of the treasure room as well.
Frances scarcely gave Pratt a thought. She presumed him far in the land of dreams. She did not take into consideration the fact that about now the scratches of the mountain lion would become painful, and Pratt correspondingly restless. Frances was mainly troubled by her father’s absence from his room. Had he, too, seen the mysterious shadow in the court? Was he on the watch for a possible marauder?
By feeling rather than eyesight she knew the door to the treasure room was closed. Was her father there?
She doubled her fist and raised it to knock upon the panel. Then she hesitated. The slightest sound would ring through the silent house like an alarm of fire.
Inclining her ear to the door, she listened. But the oak planking was thick and there was no crevice, now the portal was closed, through which any slight sound could penetrate. She could not have even distinguished the heavy breathing of a sleeping man behind the door.
Uncertain, wondering, yet quite mistress of herself again, Frances went on along the corridor. Here was an open door before her into the court. Had that shadow she had seen come this way? she wondered.
The hiss of a voice, almost in her ear, did startle her:
“My goodness! is it you, Miss Frances?”