The woman had noticed, however, and there was a faint flush on her cheek and a resentful glitter in her eye as she stood at the table, pretending to look for something in her work-basket, and for several moments speaking not a word. Suddenly, with an air of decision, she turned and walked straight out to the kitchen, going to a back door that was there and opening it. Then they heard her calling somebody in her shrill, far-reaching voice: “Silas! Si—las! _Si_las!” Silas—whom all understood to be the woman’s husband—must have been close at hand, for almost immediately a man’s voice sounded without, and then the two were heard talking together in low tones inside the kitchen. The next moment they appeared at the sitting-room door. The woman, when they entered the room, was preparing to throw a shawl about her shoulders. But nobody, at that moment, thought very much about her. Her visitors were too much struck by the appearance of the remarkable individual who attended her. He was a man of immense physical proportions, more than six feet high, and correspondingly broad. His short, stubby hair was of a dull red color, as were also the thick, wiry whiskers that covered his face. His skin, where it could be seen, was deeply burned. One of his eyes was closed and sightless. He was dressed in a big green baize jacket, oil trousers, and “fish boots.” In his hand he carried a short, heavy clam hoe. Altogether he was a formidable-looking person. The two girls uttered a little cry of dismay when they saw him; Jasper himself looked troubled, and Freddy fixed upon him a look of fascinated horror. Freddy was thoroughly familiar with the story of Polyphemus (Jasper had told it to him many times), and his one thought now was that that awful monster stood before him. “Silas,” said the woman sharply, turning toward him as she pinned her shawl, “here’s some people. I don’t know who they air, nor where they come from; but I do know that they’re stark, starin’ crazy, every one of ’em. They can’t do anythin’ but sing an’ laugh. I’m afraid of ’em; an’ I’m goin’ to run down to Squire Baker’s an’ have him send up a constable, an’ have ’em taken care of. They ought to be put in the mad-house. I want you to stay here an’ keep guard over ’em till I come back.” And with that, before Jasper and the rest had at all grasped the meaning of her words or comprehended her intention, she was gone.