“You had better mind your own concerns,” he said, “I’ll get my amusement my own way. Has there been a row that mother’s not here? I don’t mean to say that I am not obliged to you, Joan, for getting out of bed to let me in. By Jove, if I had been shut out I know what I’d have done! Was there a great row?” “What would you have done?” said Joan, still half laughing; then she started and with a little cry, said, “What’s that?” “What’s what? I’ll tell you this, I should never have crossed the door again in daylight, be sure of that, that was shut to me in the night.” Before he had finished this speech, Joan clutched him by the arm. “Don’t you hear something?” she said, “come in, come in, don’t lose a minute. What if he should lock the kitchen door? Harry, promise me you’ll not stop to say a word, but run up to your bed.” She was hurrying while she spoke, through the series of outbuildings, dragging him with her, breathless, and speaking in gasps. But as they went on from one to another there could be no longer any doubt as to what had happened. The kitchen door, which opened from these offices, was shut with a loud jar, and the key turned. “I dunno’ who’s out and about at this hour of the night,” Joscelyn was heard within, “but whoever it is they’ll stay there: some o’ the women out like the cats, dash them, or may be a good-for-nothing lad. I’ll teach them what it is to roam the country o’ nights. You’ll stay there whoever you are.” Joan lost all her self-command in the emergency. She dropped Harry’s hand and threw herself against the door. “Oh, father, father, open! do you hear me? It’s me, Joan. Open! will you let me bide out in the cold, in the dead of night? Father! let me in, let me in! you wouldn’t have the heart to shut me out all night. It’s me, _me_, Joan!” There was no reply; his steps were heard going away mounting the stairs, and a faint outcry in the distance as of the mother weeping and protesting. Joan, who was a very simple person, though so self-commanded in emergencies which her mother could not face, was altogether taken by surprise by this. She flung herself against the door with a burst of weeping. “Oh, open, open!” she said, beating upon it with her hands. Then she called out the names of the servants one after another. “I’ll not be left here all the night; open, open! do you hear! I’ll not be left here all the night. I’ll die if I am left out in the dark. I’ll not be left!” she cried with a shriek. Harry was silenced by this loud and sudden passion so close to him. It alarmed him, for Joan was the impersonation of strength and calm; but the situation was uncomfortable enough, however it could be taken. The consciousness that he had some one else to think for, some one who for the present had lost her head, and all power to think for herself, changed his own position. He caught his sister by the arm. “Don’t make such a row,” he said, “Joan, you! that was always against a fuss.”