“I’m so glad Phyllis will be with us to-night,” Miss Marcia told him, “for I’m very little company for Leslie at a time like this. I get so nervous that I have to take a sedative the doctor has given me for emergencies, and that generally puts me pretty soundly to sleep.”
They sat about the open fire after Ted had gone, listening to the commotion of the elements outside and talking fitfully. Every few moments Miss Marcia would rise, go to the window, and peer out nervously into the darkness. Once the telephone-bell rang and every one jumped. Leslie hurried to answer it.
“Oh, it’s Aunt Sally Blake!” she exclaimed. “She wants to know how we all are and if we happen to have seen anything of Eileen. She was at the hospital all the afternoon, but she hasn’t returned. Aunt Sally ’phoned the hospital, but they said Miss Ramsay had left three hours ago. She’s terribly worried about her—thinks she may have had an accident in this storm. She thought it just possible Eileen might have come on out here. I said no, but would call her up later and see if she’d had news.”
This latest turn of affairs added in no wise to Miss Marcia’s peace of mind. “Why don’t you take your powder now, Aunt Marcia, and go to bed,” Leslie suggested at last. “It’s only worrying you to sit up and watch this. There’s no danger, and you might as well go peacefully to sleep and forget it. Phyllis and I will stay up quite a while yet, and if there’s any reason for it, we will wake you.”
Miss Marcia herself thought well of the plan and was soon in bed, and, having taken her sleeping-powder, the good lady was shortly fast and dreamlessly asleep, much to the relief of the girls.
“And now let’s go into your room and watch,” whispered Phyllis. “I’m just as certain as I can be that something is going to happen to-night!”
They arranged themselves, each at a window, Phyllis at the one toward the sea; Leslie facing Curlew’s Nest, and began an exciting vigil. With the electric light switched off, it was so black, both inside and out, that it would have been difficult to distinguish anything, but with the windows shut and encrusted with wind-blown sand, it was utterly impossible. And when they dared to open them even a crack, the rain poured in and drenched them. They could do this only at intervals. Even Rags seemed to share the general uneasiness, and could find no comfortable spot in which to dispose himself, but kept hovering between the two windows continually.
It was Leslie who suddenly spoke in a hushed whisper. She had just opened her window the merest crack and peeped out, then closed it again without sound. “Phyllis, come here a moment. Look out when I open the window. It struck me that I saw something—some dark shape—slip around the corner of the house next door. See if you can see it.”
Phyllis applied her eye to the crack when the window was opened. Then she drew her head back with a jerk. “I certainly did see something!” she whispered excitedly. “It slipped back to the other side of the bungalow!” She peered out again. “Good gracious! I see it again—or else it’s another one. Doesn’t seem quite like the first figure. Can there possibly be two?”
Leslie then, becoming impatient, demanded a turn at the peep-hole, and while she was straining her gaze into the darkness, they were both electrified by a light, timid knock at the door of the front veranda.