“Yes. What is it?” demanded Ned, already very happy at the exchange of jailers.
“Only that you must explain what all this row and rumpus is about with Aunt Sally.”
Standing at the top of the steps, with one foot outstretched, old “Forty-niner” paused and steadily regarded the small face above his shoulder.
Ned returned the gaze with equal steadfastness, as if he were pondering in his troubled mind the best course to pursue. Then, because he might think more clearly so, he lifted his serious gaze to the distance; and, at once, there burst from his quivering lips a cry of fear:
“Oh, I see him! I see him! He’s coming, like he said––to kill me––to kill me! I dassent––I dassent!”
CHAPTER XIII.
NED’S STORY
“Eels couldn’t have done that slicker!” commented Ephraim, in surprise. For, behold! his arms were empty and the flash of twinkling legs along the garden path pointed whither his charges had fled. “Here they were and here they aren’t, and whatever scared them that way is more than I can see.”