quickly, and looking up and down the street, in which not another
figure moved. The pitch of the Corbury road, below lawyer Varnum's
spruces, was the favourite coasting-ground of Starkfield, and on
clear evenings the church corner rang till late with the shouts of
the coasters; but to-night not a sled darkened the whiteness of the
long declivity. The hush of midnight lay on the village, and all its
waking life was gathered behind the church windows, from which
strains of dance-music flowed with the broad bands of yellow light.

The young man, skirting the side of the building, went down the
slope toward the basement door. To keep out of range of the
revealing rays from within he made a circuit through the untrodden
snow and gradually approached the farther angle of the basement
wall. Thence, still hugging the shadow, he edged his way cautiously
forward to the nearest window, holding back his straight spare body
and craning his neck till he got a glimpse of the room.

Seen thus, from the pure and frosty darkness in which he stood, it
seemed to be seething in a mist of heat. The metal reflectors of the
gas-jets sent crude waves of light against the whitewashed walls,
and the iron flanks of the stove at the end of the hall looked as
though they were heaving with volcanic fires. The floor was thronged
with girls and young men. Down the side wall facing the window stood
a row of kitchen chairs from which the older women had just risen.
By this time the music had stopped, and the musicians-a fiddler, and
the young lady who played the harmonium on Sundays-were hastily
refreshing themselves at one corner of the supper-table which
aligned its devastated pie-dishes and ice-cream saucers on the
platform at the end of the hall. The guests were preparing to leave,
and the tide had already set toward the passage where coats and