She resumed her vigil, unable to read because of her misgivings, staring at the fire, starting at a harsher gust of wind or any unaccustomed sound. And for a long time there beat against her brain the shuffling, searching tread of her uncle. Its cessation about eleven o'clock increased her uneasiness. He had been so afraid! Suppose already the thing he had feared had overtaken him? She listened intently. Even then she seemed to sense the soundless footsteps of disaster straying in the decayed house, and searching, too. A morbid desire to satisfy herself that her uncle's silence meant nothing evil drove her upstairs. She stood in the square main hall at the head of the stairs, listening. Her uncle's bedroom door lay straight ahead. To her right and left narrow corridors led to the wings. Her room and Bobby's and a spare room were in the right-hand wing. The opposite corridor was seldom used, for the left-hand wing was the oldest portion of the house, and in the march of years too many legends had gathered about it. The large bedroom was there with its private hall beyond, and a narrow, enclosed staircase, descending to the library. Originally it had been the custom for the head of the family to use that room. Its ancient furniture still faded within stained walls. For many years no one had slept in it, because it had sheltered too much suffering, because it had witnessed the reluctant spiritual departure of too many Blackburns. Katherine shrank a little from the black entrance of the corridor, but her anxiety centred on the door ahead. She was about to call when a stirring beyond it momentarily reassured her. The door opened and her uncle stepped out. He wore an untidy dressing-gown. His hair was disordered. His face appeared grayer and more haggard than it had downstairs. A lighted candle shook in his right hand. "What are you doing up here, Katy?" he quavered. She broke down before the picture of his increased fear. He shuffled closer. "What you crying for, Katy?" She controlled herself. She begged him for an answer to her doubts. "You make me afraid." He laughed scornfully. "You! What you got to be afraid of?" "I'm afraid because you are," she urged. "You've got to tell me. I'm all alone. I can't stand it. What are you afraid of?" He didn't answer. He shuffled on toward the disused wing. Her hand tightened on the banister. "Where are you going?" she whispered. He turned at the entrance to the corridor. "I am going to the old bedroom." "Why? Why?" she asked hysterically. "You can't sleep there. The bed isn't even made." He lowered his voice to a hoarse whisper: "Don't you mention I've gone there. If you want to know, I am afraid. I'm afraid to sleep in my own room any longer." She nodded. "And you don't think they'd look for you there. What is it? Tell me what it is. Why don't you send for some one--a man?" "Leave me alone," he mumbled. "Nothing for you to be worried about, except Bobby."