If Mrs. Merrick was surprised or suspected anything when Rodney put the letters into her stove and stood over them long enough to see them reduced to ashes, she made no remark. As he was about to return to his seat at the table there came a sound that arrested his steps, and brought Tom Percival out of his chair in a twinkling. The doors and windows were all closed (the curtains were pulled down as well, so that no one on the outside could see into the room), but the words, which were uttered in a muffled voice, came distinctly to their ears: "Hallo, the house!" "There they are," whispered Tom, thrusting his hand into his breast pocket and glancing toward Rodney as if to assure himself that the latter could be depended on in an emergency. "Sit down and keep perfectly quiet," said Mrs. Merrick, in a calm tone. "They are ready to shoot, and you mustn't move about for fear of throwing your shadow upon one of the window curtains." [Illustration: MRS. MERRICK STANDS GUARD.] "Are they looking for your husband?" Rodney managed to ask. "I suppose they are," answered the woman, who did not even change color. "I will go to the door and find out." "You mustn't," protested Rodney. "Mr. Merrick said he didn't take any notice of hails after dark." "He doesn't, but I do," replied the wife. "Somebody must answer, or we couldn't live in this country a day longer." "Do you recognize the voice?" "Of course not," said Tom Percival. "They are strangers from some other county." "Why can't we go with her and return their fire," exclaimed Rodney, as Mrs. Merrick left the room and moved along the wide hall toward the front door. "I'll not stay here like a bump on a log and let her be shot at, now I--" "Come back here. Sit down and behave yourself or you'll play smash," said Tom, earnestly. "They'll not harm her. It's her husband they are after. Now listen." Rodney sat down in the nearest chair, rested the hand that held his revolver on the table, and waited and listened with as much patience as he could command. CHAPTER XI. RODNEY MAKES A TRADE. "You are a pretty partisan, you are," whispered Tom Percival, while they were waiting for Mrs. Merrick to open the front-door. "Those men outside are friends of yours, and yet you stand ready to fight them." "I don't claim friendship with any cowardly bushwhacker," answered Rodney hotly. "I don't collogue [associate] with any such." "Then you'll have to do one of two things," said Tom. "Go home and stay there, or else join the Confederate army. Nearly every man in Missouri is a bushwhacker. Now listen."