Anna Katharine Green

“ That he had come to rob and only waited to take her off her guard she now felt certain, and rapidly running over in her mind all the expedients of self-defense possible to one in her situation, she suddenly remembered the pistol which Ned kept in his desk. Oh, why had she not thought of it before! Why had she let herself grow mad with terror when here, within reach of her hand, lay such a means of self-defense? With a feeling of joy (she had always hated pistols before and scolded Ned when he bought this one) she started to her feet and slid her hand into the drawer. ”

“ Meanwhile no sound came from the kitchen, only that dreadful sense of a doom creeping upon her—a sense that grew in intensity till she found herself watching for the shadow of that lifted stick on the wall of the entry, and almost imagined she saw the tip of it appearing, when without any premonition, that fatal side door again blew in and admitted another man of so threatening an aspect that she succumbed instantly before him and forgot all her former fears in this new terror. ”

“ O God!” she moaned, and lifting the head in her two hands she gave the motionless features a long and searching look. “Water!” she cried. “Bring water.” But before the now obedient tramp could respond, she had torn off the woolly wig disfiguring the dead man’s head, and seeing the blond curls beneath had uttered such a shriek that it rose above the gale and was heard by her distant neighbors.
It was the head and hair of her husband. ”

“ Her first thought was that it was her husband come back, but before she could clear her eyes from the cloud of snow which had entered with him he had thrown off his outer covering and she found herself face to face with a man in whose powerful frame and cynical visage she saw little to comfort her and much to surprise and alarm.
“Ugh!” was his coarse and rather familiar greeting. “A hard night, missus! Enough to drive any man indoors. ”

“ But his fancy ended its flight at the sink, and before her hopes had fully subsided he was standing on the threshold of the sitting-room door.
“It’s pretty here,” he exclaimed, allowing his eye to rove again over every hiding-place within sight. “I wonder now”—He stopped. His glance had fallen on the cupboard over her husband’s desk. ”

“ A man can’t live in a gale like that, specially after a tramp of twenty miles or more. Shall I shut the door for you?” he asked, with a mixture of bravado and good nature that frightened her more and more. ”

“ Certainly by two.”
“And our neighbors go to bed at ten,” she murmured. But the words were low, and she was glad he did not hear them, for if it was his duty to obey the orders he had received, then it was her duty to meet the position in which it left her as bravely as she could. ”