The next morning her eyes upon Mrs. Dent were wary and blazing with suppressed excitement. She kept opening her mouth as if to speak, then frowning, and setting her lips hard. After breakfast she went upstairs, and came down presently with her coat and bonnet.
"Now, Emeline," she said, "I want to know where the Slocums live."Mrs. Dent gave a strange, long, half-lidded glance at her. She was finishing her coffee.
"Why?" she asked.
"I'm going over there and find out if they have heard anything from her daughter and Agnes since they went away. I don't like what Iheard last night."
"You must have been dreaming."
"It don't make any odds whether I was or not. Does she play 'The Maiden's Prayer' on the piano? I want to know.""What if she does? She plays it a little, I believe. I don't know. She don't half play it, anyhow; she ain't got an ear.""That wasn't half played last night. I don't like such things happening. I ain't superstitious, but I don't like it. I'm going.
Where do the Slocum's live?"
"You go down the road over the bridge past the old grist mill, then you turn to the left; it's the only house for half a mile. You can t miss it. It has a barn with a ship in full sail on the cupola.""Well, I'm going. I don't feel easy."
About two hours later Rebecca returned. There were red spots on her cheeks. She looked wild. "I've been there," she said, and there isn't a soul at home. Something HAS happened.""What has happened?"
"I don't know. Something. I had a warning last night. There wasn't a soul there. They've been sent for to Lincoln.""Did you see anybody to ask?" asked Mrs. Dent with thinly concealed anxiety.
"I asked the woman that lives on the turn of the road. She's stone deaf. I suppose you know. She listened while I screamed at her to know where the Slocums were, and then she said, 'Mrs. Smith don't live here.' I didn't see anybody on the road, and that's the only house. What do you suppose it means?""I don't suppose it means much of anything," replied Mrs. Dent coolly. "Mr. Slocum is conductor on the railroad, and he'd be away anyway, and Mrs. Slocum often goes early when he does, to spend the day with her sister in Porter's Falls. She'd be more likely to go away than Addie.""And you don't think anything has happened?" Rebecca asked with diminishing distrust before the reasonableness of it.
"Land, no!"
Rebecca went upstairs to lay aside her coat and bonnet. But she came hurrying back with them still on.
"Who's been in my room?" she gasped. Her face was pale as ashes.
Mrs. Dent also paled as she regarded her.
"What do you mean?" she asked slowly.
"I found when I went upstairs that--little nightgown of--Agnes's on--the bed, laid out. It was--LAID OUT. The sleeves were folded across the bosom, and there was that little red rose between them.
Emeline, what is it? Emeline, what's the matter? Oh!"Mrs. Dent was struggling for breath in great, choking gasps. She clung to the back of a chair. Rebecca, trembling herself so she could scarcely keep on her feet, got her some water.
As soon as she recovered herself Mrs. Dent regarded her with eyes full of the strangest mixture of fear and horror and hostility.
"What do you mean talking so?" she said in a hard voice.
"It IS THERE."
"Nonsense. You threw it down and it fell that way.""It was folded in my bureau drawer."
"It couldn't have been."
"Who picked that red rose?"
"Look on the bush," Mrs. Dent replied shortly.
Rebecca looked at her; her mouth gaped. She hurried out of the room. When she came back her eyes seemed to protrude. (She had in the meantime hastened upstairs, and come down with tottering steps, clinging to the banisters.)"Now I want to know what all this means?" she demanded.
"What what means?"
"The rose is on the bush, and it's gone from the bed in my room!
Is this house haunted, or what?"
"I don't know anything about a house being haunted. I don't believe in such things. Be you crazy?" Mrs. Dent spoke with gathering force. The colour flashed back to her cheeks.
"No," said Rebecca shortly. "I ain't crazy yet, but I shall be if this keeps on much longer. I'm going to find out where that girl is before night."Mrs. Dent eyed her.
"What be you going to do?"
"I'm going to Lincoln."
A faint triumphant smile overspread Mrs. Dent's large face.
"You can't," said she; "there ain't any train.""No train?"