Patsy took heart at this brilliant effort on her behalf.
“That’s why I saw the cavalier picture move the other day,” she said eagerly. “Rosita had just disappeared behind it. That’s another proof she came here in the daytime.”
“Hmph! Here is something else I seem to have missed hearing,” satirically commented Miss Carroll.
“I would have told you that, truly I would have, Auntie, but I didn’t want to worry you. I thought I must have been mistaken about it at the time and so didn’t say anything. It was the day we found the book in the patio and you asked me what was the matter,” Patsy explained very humbly.
Something in the two pleading gray eyes fixed so penitently upon her, moved Miss Martha to relent a trifle. She considered herself a great deal harder-hearted than she really was.
“My dear, you and Beatrice did very wrong to conceal these things and attempt to take matters into your own hands. You are two extremely rash venturesome young girls. You are altogether too fond of leaping first and looking afterward. I must say that——”
“They’re coming!” Mabel suddenly held up her hand in a listening gesture.
Even through the closed door the tramp of heavy footsteps and the deep bass of masculine voices came distinctly to the ears of the attentive listeners. Shut in as they were, they could glean by sound alone an idea of what was transpiring in the gallery.
Soon, above the growing hum of voices, came a crashing, splintering sound, accompanied by the most ear-piercing shrieks they had yet heard. A babble of shouts arose, above which that high, piercing wail held its own. Again the tramping of feet began. The frenzied wailing grew even higher. The footsteps began to die out; the cries grew fainter and yet fainter. An almost painful silence suddenly settled down over the house.