"Well," said Ellen, as she turned uneasily upon her bed, "it's no affair of mine; I can't help it, whatever she does. But oh, won't Aunt Fortune be angry!" Nancy presently came down with her frock gathered up into a bag before her. "What do you think I have got here?" said she. "I s'pose you didn't know there was a basket of fine hickory nuts up there in the corner? Was it you or Miss Fortune that hid them away so nicely? I s'pose she thought nobody would ever think of looking behind the great blue chest and under the feather bed, but it takes me! Miss Fortune was afraid of your stealing 'em I guess, Ellen?" "She needn't have been," said Ellen indignantly. "No, I suppose you wouldn't take 'em if you saw 'em; you wouldn't eat 'em if they were cracked for you, would you?" She flung some on Ellen's bed as she spoke. Nancy had seated herself on the floor, and using for a hammer a piece of old iron she had brought down with her from the garret, she was cracking the nuts on the clean white hearth. "Indeed I wouldn't!" said Ellen, throwing them back; "and you oughtn't to crack them there, Nancy; you'll make a dreadful muss." "What do you think I care?" said the other scornfully. She leisurely cracked and eat as many as she pleased of the nuts, bestowing the rest in the bosom of her frock. Ellen watched fearfully for her next move. If she should open the little door and get among her books and boxes! Nancy's first care, however, was the cup of gruel. It was found too hot for any mortal lips to bear, so it was set on one side to cool. Then, taking up her rambling examination of the room, she went from window to window. "What fine big windows! one might get in here easy enough. I declare, Ellen, some night I'll set the ladder up against here, and the first thing you'll see will be me coming in. You'll have me to sleep with you before you think." "I'll fasten my windows," said Ellen. "No, you won't. You'll do it a night or two, may be, but then you'll forget it. I shall find them open when I come. Oh, I'll come!" "But I could call Aunt Fortune," said Ellen. "No, you couldn't, 'cause if you spoke a word I'd tickle you to death; that's what I'd do. I know how to fix you off. And if you did call her I'd just whap out of the window and run off with my ladder, and then you'd get a fine combing for disturbing the house. What's in this trunk?" "Only my clothes and things," said Ellen. "Oh goody! that's fine; now I'll have a look at 'em. That's just what I wanted, only I didn't know it. Where's the key? Oh, here it is sticking in--that's good!" "Oh, please don't!" said Ellen, raising herself on her elbows, "they're all in nice order, and you'll get them all in confusion. Oh, do let them alone!"