"I will. Let's get out of this hole." "Is it safe?" "My dear! ... Did you think I was going to store you among the potatoes?" "I'll carry you up." "No, I'm all right again. I must lead you." She pulled him after her towards the stairs. She made no allowance for his unfamiliarity with the place, and he fell over the bottom step with a clatter. Don went rigid. Pen laughed as women do in the dark. "Clumsy!" she whispered. In the kitchen he asked for water. She led him to the pail, and held the dipper to his lips. They both drank like hard driven horses, and sighed with refreshment. Then she led him up the back stairs. At the top she left him for a moment while she blew out the lamps in the back rooms. When they got to the main upper hall, through the transom over Pendleton's door they heard a sound like a saw being drawn very slowly through rotten wood. It started Pen off again. She hastily pulled Don into her room, and closing her door, smothered her laughter in his neck. It started him going. They quivered and rocked with suppressed laughter. They finally sank down on a sofa weak, but immensely refreshed. There is nothing like laughter. "What room is this?" whispered Don. "My room." "Oh, Pen!" he murmured on a deep note. "Don't you like being here?" He drew her hard against his side. "Oh Pen! ... I can't tell you how it makes me feel!" "What more natural refuge could you have, dear?" "But where are you going to keep me, Pen?" he asked. "Right here." He drew away from her. "Oh no, I couldn't let you." She became angry immediately. "Why not? Is it because of the danger to my reputation? ... How perfectly silly under the circumstances!" "It isn't only that," he muttered sullenly. "It's the same old thing. Hiding behind your skirts. I can't bear it. Why, suppose I were found here?" All at once they seemed completely divided. "Oh, you make me so angry!" she said helplessly. "Thinking about what people would say? You think more of what people say than you do of me! What have you and I got to do with what people say?" "You're not quite fair to me," he said. The note of quiet stubbornness terrified her. Here was a force she could not gauge. "Oh, we must not quarrel!" she murmured with a catch in her breath ... "Oh, Don, I love you so!" "Oh my Pen!" he murmured gathering her in his arms again. There was a blessed peaceful interlude. After awhile she murmured in a small voice: "Then you will stay here until we can think up something else?" But the quiet stubbornness was unaltered. "I won't promise anything. I must be free to decide." "But Don! After all the trouble I have had to get you here! You're in my castle, and I must know where I have you. Mustn't you let me decide for the time being?" "That's just the rub," he said ruefully. "You're so bossy, Pen. If you had me here right under your thumb I wouldn't be able to call my soul my own."