"Hang sleep!" Tom replied.
"All right, but we must blow out the light. Lucky it's clear. Let's whisper after this."
Tom threw himself on the bed, while Dan sat near the window and kept his eyes fixed on the door of the bowling-alley. They talked for some time in low tones, but eventually Tom fell asleep. Dan waked him at twelve for his vigil, and he in turn was wakened at two. During the third watch they both succumbed to weariness.
Tow awoke with a start about four, and sprang to the window. The moon was sinking low in the western sky, but its light still flooded the deserted courtyard beneath. He heard the patter of a horse's hoofs on the road beyond and the crunching of the snow beneath the runners of a sleigh. Well, he thought, as he rubbed his eyes, it was too near morning for anything to happen, so he turned in and was soon asleep, as though no difficult problems were puzzling his mind and heart and no mysteries were being enacted around him.
CHAPTER VII
A DISAPPEARANCE
When Dan came downstairs in the morning Mrs. Frost called him to the door of her bedroom. "What on earth is the matter with Nancy?" she exclaimed; "I have been waiting for her the past hour. No one has been near me since Deborah came in to lay the fire. Call the girl Danny; I want to get up."
"All right, mother. She has probably overslept; she had a long walk yesterday."
"But that is no excuse for sleeping till this time of day. Tell her to hurry."