"I think we'd better search the barn, anyhow," some one else said, and a good many murmured assent.
"Wait a minute, I'll be down," said Phineas, shutting his window.
How long poor Ann lay there shaking, she never knew. It seemed hours. She heard Phineas go down stairs, and unlock the door. She heard them tramp into the barn. "O, if I had hidden him there!" she thought.
After a while, she heard them out in the yard again. "He could not have gotten into the house, in any way," she heard one man remark speculatively. How she waited for the response. It came in Phineas Adams' slow, sensible tones: "How could he ? Didn't you hear me unbolt the door when I came out ? The doors are all fastened, I saw to it myself."
"Well, of course he didn't," agreed the voiec.
At last, Phineas came in, and Ann heard them go. She was so thankful. However, the future perplexities, which lay before her, were enough to keep her awake for the rest of the night. In the
