"No," answered Mollie. "You see the room is some distance from the front of the house. And I was too frightened to know what I was doing. Besides, I fainted, at first, you know. And I thought you girls would run when—when you saw that white thing that grabbed me. I was disappointed when you were not at the auto here."
"What was—what was it that grabbed you?" faltered Amy, in awed tones.
"You needn't be so mysterious about it," laughed Mollie. She could laugh now—the strain was over. "It was a man who grabbed me, I'm certain of that. And a man I have seen before!"
"Seen before!" cried Betty. "What do you mean? Who was he?"
"I don't know. But what I do know is that he had a queer scar on the hand that grabbed me. And somewhere—I can't recall now, I'm in such a flutter—I've seen that man and his scar before."
"Try to think," urged Mr. Blackford. "We must get at the bottom of this outrage, and if you can give us a clue it will help a lot."
"I can't think now," protested Mollie, weakly. "Maybe it will come to me later. Oh, what a night! If only our auto would work we could get to—some place."
"Suppose you let me have a look," suggested Mr. Blackford. "I know something of the mechanism of a car."
"Oh, if you can only get this one to—mote!" sighed Mollie.
Mr. Blackford proved that he did know considerable about a car, for he soon discovered that the trouble was a simple disarrangement of the ignition system.