She could see the light from the porch lamp which made a golden shaft through the wire netting into the darkness of the night. Over her head the stars twinkled and the leafy branches of the maple spread out like a network.
Pouf!—Rosemary scrambled to her feet, brushing at her face frantically.
"Something fell on me!" she gasped. "A bug—I'm almost sure it was a bug!"
But after feeling around on the quilt and finding nothing that felt like a bug, she decided that after all it might have been a leaf. She didn't mind the thought of a leaf tumbling down on her nose, so she carefully smoothed out the tumbled quilt, shook the blanket and laid them straight and went to bed again.
Usually she fell asleep readily, but to-night she did not feel sleepy.
"I wonder what time it is?" she meditated, turning sideways so that if another leaf—or bug—should drop it would not fall on her face. "I wish I'd brought my little clock."
Presently she heard the sound of horse's hoofs on the road, soon saw the winking white light turn into the drive that led to the barn. She watched it moving slowly forward, saw it stop and knew that Richard and Warren were harnessing outside the barn. In another moment the light flickered out as Warren backed the runabout into the shed and Richard led the horse to a stall. The hollow echo of the barn door as Richard slammed and bolted it, came next. She thought she could see the dim outline of two figures walking toward the bungalow but that might have been imagination.
Rosemary sighed and twisted about uneasily to face the other way. The porch light was out! That meant her mother and Hugh had gone to bed and she was utterly alone on the lawn. She felt inexplicably abandoned—Hugh might have whistled to her, to see if she were asleep, before he turned off the light. That, thought Rosemary, would not have been much to do.
She decided to lie flat on her back for a while. In that position she might begin to feel sleepy. It was not a pitch-black night, indeed the darkness seemed half luminous—the kind of light in which, after the eyes have grown accustomed to it, it is possible to make out the outlines of objects quite plainly. Rosemary knew she could not be mistaken when she saw a shadowy form on the other side of the lawn.
She sat up with a jerk, staring. Yes, something was certainly moving. Frantically she recalled her arguments that all animals slept at night. How foolish she had been to advance a statement of that sort. Vividly now she remembered stories heard and read of night marauders—foxes, weasels—skunks! These prowled about at night and she wouldn't care to come in contact with any of them.