"How do you know they will?" asked Sarah.
"Because," said Winnie with terrible finality.
Sarah and Shirley were asleep two minutes after their heads touched the pillow; and the house was in darkness soon after, for they were all tired from the events of the day.
In her room, though, Rosemary did not find that sleep came immediately. After lying quietly in bed, staring into the soft darkness, she felt more wide-awake than ever. She slipped softly to the floor, felt for and found her pretty white dressing gown and slippers—Rosemary was very fond of white—which were close at hand and, wrapping herself up comfortably, pattered over to the open window.
It was a moonlight night, warm and sweet, and Rosemary knelt down with a little gasp at the loveliness spread before her. She rested her elbows on the low window sill and leaned forward, drinking in the scent of new hay and roses and dewy grass. The shrill, insistent chorus of insects was music, and when the mournful cry of a distant hoot owl came out of the woods that rose shadowy and dark across the white ribbon of road, why that was music, too. Country nights are no more absolutely silent than nights in the town or city, but some enchantment weaves the noises of the countryside into graceful harmony. The cry of a bird, the soft stirring of the animals in the barns, the far barking of a watchful dog—all these Rosemary heard; and the insects filled in the pauses.
She did not know how long she had been at the window when, faintly—miles away, she would have said—she heard the notes of a violin.
"Rosemary!" whispered someone from the doorway. "Are you awake, darling?"
Mrs. Willis came across the room and knelt beside her daughter.
"Did you hear it, Mother? It couldn't be a violin—yes, it is! But at this time of night and way out in the country!"
"Listen!" said Mrs. Willis softly.