Then she almost slept. The reason she did not quite sleep was an abrupt volley of shots. She sprang to her feet with an angry exclamation.
"Haven't they stopped hunting me yet?" she snapped.
CHAPTER III
MISS ACCESSORY-AFTER-THE-FACT
Her initial impulse was to dash out of the boat-house, confront her pursuers, and visit them with a merited rebuke for having disturbed her rest. Not for an instant did it occur to Miss Chalmers that anybody else's rest had been disturbed by her.
But she remembered that she was not yet announced upon Witherbee's Island; that she would not, in fact, arrive until morning, so far as the official statement was concerned. So she checked her rush and occupied a wise half-minute in putting on her shoes.
Tiptoeing across squeaking boards to the open doorway, she looked out and turned her head in either direction. Silence had followed the shots. She could see no lights on the island. Everything was as restful and somnolent as a lecture on metaphysics.
She stepped out on the little float, from which she could obtain a better view of the wharf and the beginning of the gravel path. There was neither sign nor sound of the pajama squad, facts that contributed greatly to her satisfaction. Not a glimmer came from the direction of the house.
The shots puzzled her. She was wide-awake now, and she was quite sure she had not dreamed a volley. Pausing for a couple of minutes on the float, she made her way noiselessly to the dock, where she stopped to listen again.
"I know perfectly well I heard shooting," she remarked. "I'm not given to imagining things. There!"