Still Charles said nothing. His face, only half illumined by the light through the crack, which struck across his fixed eyes, was grim and perplexed. They saw Mary at her father's side, but the hood of her sunbonnet hid her face from view. The three stood talking for several minutes; then Mary was seen leaving and turning in their direction. "She's coming to tell us," Kenneth said. "Now, we'll know. Keep still. Maybe she is afraid we'll be seen or heard at work." Mary appeared in the doorway. She removed her bonnet and smiled reassuringly. "Frightened out of your skins, I'll bet," she jested. "I came to tell you. He is not looking for you. He said so plainly, for he saw how worried I was. In fact, he said that Tobe was still improving, and hinted--he didn't say so in so many words--but he hinted that he knew you both were about the place, and that he was not going to molest you now that Tobe is out of danger." Charles was staring at her fixedly; the animation that should have been in his face was absent. "Then he wanted to see your father about something else?" he said. "Yes, some business, or--" Mary broke off, and with a sudden shadow across her face she stood staring at him. "I don't know what he wanted to see father about. It seemed to me that it was of a private nature, and so--so that's why I came away." "Gee! what does it amount to, since he's letting us go?" said Martin. He stepped to his sister's side and stood with his arm around her waist. For once she seemed unaware of the boy's presence. She was recalling something Albert Frazier had said about the sheriff's opinion of Charles. Could the present visit pertain to him? "Thank the Lord, he's off!" Kenneth exclaimed. "Bully boy, that chap!" The brothers went to the doorway, looked all around, and then hastened away to meet their father, who was slowly coming toward the shop. They joined him. "Where is your sister?" he asked. They told him, and he went on, as if only partially conscious of their eager questions. "Oh, that's all right!" he said, impatiently. "He is not going to bother you. Oh, Mary, where are you?" "Here, father," she answered, as she came out, accompanied by Charles. "Did you want me?" It seemed to her that he now glanced at Charles with a look of vague displeasure on his face. "Yes, I want to see you. Come to the house with me, please." Mary was sure now that something pertaining to Charles had happened, for her father was treating him in a manner that surely indicated it; the old man had taken no notice of him, and that was most unusual. Leaving the others in the shop, Rowland led his daughter toward the house. "I wanted to see you about a little matter that may be rather serious," he began. "The sheriff didn't come to see me about the boys at all, but about Mr. Brown." "About him!" Mary said, faintly. "What about him?"