"If you have told all you have on your mind you can go back to bed," said Marcy, after a little pause.
"That's all," answered Morris. "I wish you a very good evening, sar—you and the missus." And he passed into the hall, closing the door behind him. Marcy waited until he heard the outer door shut, and then he walked over and took a look at the fallen chandelier.
"Wouldn't Beardsley be hopping if he knew that one of his own negroes had upset his plans?" said he. "I really believe he would be the death of that girl Nancy. Julius is wide awake, but I do wish he would not keep so much to himself, and that I could place more dependence on what he says."
"But you do not mean to put him to work?" said his mother.
"Oh, no; and the rascal knows it. He would not stay in the field two minutes without some one to watch him, and he is of use about the house. Now, go and get some sleep, mother, and I will see that things are secure."
Once more Marcy made the rounds of the building, and this time he did not find things just as they ought to be. He found how the robbers had effected an entrance. They had cut a hole through the side door so that they could reach in and turn the key in the lock and draw back the bolt. Probably Morris was hiding in the stable when they did it, too badly frightened to give the alarm; but the robbers would not have done their work entirely undisturbed if Bose had not been dead on his mat around the corner.
"If Morris and Julius knew this thing was going to happen, I do not understand why they did not warn us," said Mrs. Gray, when Marcy came back to the sitting-room.
"Because they are darkies, and darkies never do what they ought," answered Marcy. "They did not want us to be frightened until the time came, and so they stayed awake and watched while we slept. Good-night."
When Marcy went up to his room he took his pillows from the floor, and put them on the bed where they belonged. He pushed his revolvers under them, smiling grimly when he thought of the little use they had been to him when their services were really needed, turned down the lamp, and was about to throw himself upon his couch, without removing his clothes, when he heard something that had startled him once before—the noise made by a pebble striking against his window. That was the way in which Sailor Jack attracted his attention on the night he came up from Newbern, after piloting that Northern blockade runner safely into port; but who could this person be? The dread of danger, that was uppermost in his mind when he stepped to the window and opened it, gave way to indignation when he looked out and saw the boy Julius standing on the ground below.
"Look here, you imp of darkness," he exclaimed.