That night, as the two men sat on the porch, watching the last of the light on the mountain tops, they heard again the cry of fear and pain that came from the little house hidden in the depths of the orange grove. Wonderingly they listened. Once more it came--filled with shuddering terror. When the sound was not repeated, Conrad Lagrange thoughtfully knocked the ashes from his pipe. "Poor soul," he said. "Those scars did more than disfigure her beautiful face. I'll wager there's a sad story there, Aaron. It's strange how I am haunted by the impression that I ought to know her. But I can't make it come clear. Heigho,"--he added a moment later as if to free his mind from unpleasant thoughts,--"I'll be glad when we are safely up in the hills yonder. Do you know, old man, I feel as though we're getting away just in the nick of time. My back hair and the pricking of my thumbs warn me that your dearly beloved spooks are combining to put up some sort of a spooking job on us. I hope Yee Kee has a plentiful supply of joss-sticks to stand 'em off, if they get too busy while we are gone." Aaron King laughed quietly in the dusk, as he returned "And I have a presentiment that those precious members of our household are preparing to accompany us to the hills. I feel in my bones that something is going to happen up there"--he pointed to the distant mountains, then added--"to me, at least. I feel as though I were about to bid myself good-by--if you know what I mean. I hope that donkey of ours isn't a psychic donkey, or, if he is, that he'll listen to reason and be content with his escorts of flesh and blood." As he finished speaking, the quiet of the evening was broken by a lusty, "Hee-haw, hee-haw," in front of the house. "There, I told you so!" ejaculated the painter. Laughing, the two men followed Czar down the walk, in the dark, to receive the shaggy, long-eared companion for their wanderings. As many a man has done--Aaron King had spoken, in jest, more truth than he knew. Chapter XIV In The Mountains In the gray of the early morning, hours before the dwellers on Fairlands Heights thought of leaving their beds, Aaron King and Conrad Lagrange made ready for their going.