At this point something caused Northrup to look around.
Upon a bench near by, hunched like a gargoyle, with her vague face nested in the palms of her thin hands, sat the girl he had noted in the yellow house the day of his arrival. One glance at her and she seemed to bring the scene back. The sunny room, the children, the dogs, and the girl on the table, who had soon become so familiar to him.
"Good Lord!" he ejaculated. "And who are you?"
Another name become a person! Northrup smiled. They were all materializing; the names, the stories.
There was a pause. The girl was studying him slowly, almost painfully, but she did not speak.
This made talk and filled an uncomfortable pause.
"Yep. Left on the town. Folks take me in turn-about. I just jog along. I'm staying over to the Point now. Next I'm going to Aunt Polly. I chooses, I do. I likes to jog along."
The girl was inclined to be friendly and she was amusing.
"Did you hear the bell ring the night you came--the ha'nt bell?" she asked.
"'Twas a warning, and then here _you_ are! Generally warnings mean bad things, but Aunt Polly says you're right enough and generally they ain't when they're young."
"Men. When they get old, like Uncle Peter, they meller or----"
Northrup laughed. The sound disturbed the girl and she scowled.
"It's terrible to have folks think you're a fool to be laughed at," she muttered. "I can't get things over."
Northrup was becoming interested. If straws show the wind's quarter, then a bit of driftwood may be depended upon to indicate the course of a stream. Northrup was again both amused and surprised to find how his very ordinary presence in King's Forest was, apparently, affecting the natives. Jan-an took on new proportions as she was regarded in the light of a straw or a bit of driftwood.
"Yer feelin's," the girl answered simply. "When you don' understand like most do, yer feelin's count, they do!"
The girl considered this and struggled, evidently, to adjust her companion to suit her needs, but at last she shook her head.
"I ain't going to take no chances with yer!" she muttered at length. "'Tain't natural. Aunt Polly and Uncle Peter ain't risking so much as--her----"
"You mean----" Northrup felt guilty. He knew whom the girl meant--he felt as if he were taking advantage; eavesdropping or reading someone else's letter.
