"What are you doing to that door?" cried the Duchess sharply, as she entered with the others. I was securing the bar again. "Nothing," I said stolidly. "I am seeing that it is fast." "And hoity toity, miss!" she continued, turning to Anne. "What has come over you, I would like to know? Stop crying, girl; what is the matter with you? Will you shame us all before this Dutch maid? Here, carry these things to the back door." Anne somehow stifled her sobs and rose. Seeming by a great effort to recover composure, she went out, keeping her face to the last averted from me. We all followed, variously laden, Master Lindstrom and Van Tree, who carried between them the plate-chest, being the last to leave. There was not one of us--even of us who had only known the house a few weeks--who did not heave a sigh as we passed out of the warm lamp-lit parlor, which, littered as it was with the debris of packing, looked still pleasant and comfortable in comparison with the darkness outside and the uncertain future before us. What, then, must have been the pain of parting to those who had never known any other home? Yet they took it bravely. To Dymphna, Van Tree's return had brought great happiness. To Master Lindstrom, any ending to a long series of anxieties and humiliations was welcome. To Van Tree--well, he had Dymphna with him, and his side of the plate-chest was heavy, and gave him ample employment. We passed out silently through the back door, leaving the young Dutchman to lock it behind us, and flitted, a line of gliding shadows, through the orchard. It was two o'clock, the sky was overcast, a slight drizzle was falling. Once an alarm was given that we were being followed; and we huddled together, and stood breathless, a clump of dark figures gazing affrightedly at the tree trunks which surrounded us, and which seemed--at least to the women's eyes--to be moving, and to be men closing in on us. But the alarm was groundless, and with no greater mishap than a few stumbles when we came to the slippery edge of the creek, we reached the boat, and one by one, admirably ordered by our host, got in and took our seats. Van Tree and Master Lindstrom pushed us off; then they swung themselves in and paddled warily along, close under the bank, where the shadows of the poplars fell across us, and our figures blended darkly with the line of rushes on the shore. CHAPTER XII. ANNE'S PETITION.