He wondered if he did not hear their quick, furtive steps, and see the vanishing shadows of them.
He entered a carpenter's shop.

On the bench was an unfinished door, a plane left where it had been shoved half the length of its edge, the fresh pine shaving still curling over the side.

He left with an uncanny feeling that the carpenter, breathing softly, had watched him from some hiding-place, and would now come stealthily out to push his plane again.
He turned into a baker's shop and saw freshly chopped kindling piled against the oven, and dough actually on the kneading-tray.

In a tanner's vat he found fresh bark.

In a blacksmith's shop he entered next the fire was out, but there was coal heaped beside the forge, with the ladling-pool and the crooked water-horn, and on the anvil was a horseshoe that had cooled before it was finished.
With something akin to terror, he now turned from this street of shops into one of those with the pleasant dwellings, eager to find something alive, even a dog to bark an alarm.