Katherine was glad she was late and that she had to dress in a hurry. What she dreaded was being left alone with nothing to do but think. She had gone over the ground again and again until she had lost her sense of proportion. She had tried to believe that the raid was right and that her father's methods were above reproach; she had tried to be unwavering in her loyalty to his cause, but in spite of herself McNally's allusions and the fragmentary conversations she had overheard raised doubts which her father's evasions did not set at rest. In spite of herself her sympathies swung to the square, straightforward, courageous young fellow who had got into her heart without her knowing it. She had tried to make herself believe her father's insinuations about Jim Weeks; but what Harvey had told her, in his undiscriminating, hero-worshipping way, had made too deep an impression for that. When she had finished dressing, as she stood before the mirror to take a final survey, she addressed a parting remark to the figure in the glass:-- “It won't do you any good to go on bothering this way. You haven't anything to do now but go down to dinner and be as charming as possible, particularly to Mr. McNally, whom you cordially detest. When the time comes to do something, I hope you'll do it right.” It was just seven o'clock when she came down the stairs to be informed by the butler that the gentlemen had not come home yet, and should he serve dinner at once? Katherine waited nearly half an hour, trying to amuse herself with a very pictorial magazine, and, finding that tiresome, by playing coon songs at the piano. But the piano reminded her of Mr. McNally, and she didn't want to think of him; so giving up trying to wait she ordered dinner. Dining alone when you have made up your mind to it beforehand is not an unmixed evil; but in Katherine's frame of mind it was about as irritating as anything could be. When it was over she called for her coffee in a big cup, and she drank it, black and bitter, with a relish. The frown which for the last hour had been contracting her level brows disappeared, for she had thought of something to do. As she rose from the table she said to the butler:-- “Will you order the carriage, please, right away. I'm going out.” Porter was with McNally in one of the offices of the M. & T. station. The two had been sitting there ever since the building had been seized by the deputies, getting satisfactory reports from station after station as the raiders moved up the line. Porter was on the point of starting home for dinner when the reports began coming in from Tillman City. The first of the yellow sheets the boy brought them simply repeated the news that had come in so many times that afternoon. The station was in the hands of the C. & S.C. men, and there had been no resistance. But the second sheet was less satisfactory, for it told of Stevens's escape on the yard engine.