CHAPTER IV

It was not that I didn't wait on this occasion for more, for I was rooted as deeply as I was

shaken.

Was there a secret at bligh?

A mystery of Udolfo or an insane, an unmentionable relative kept an unsuspected confinement.

I can't say how long I turned it over, or how long in a confusion of curiosity and dread,

I remained where I'd had my collision.

I only recall that when I re-entered the house, darkness had quite closed in.

Adjutation in the interval certainly had held me and driven me, for I must, in circling

about the place, have walked three miles.

But I was to be, later on, so much more overwhelmed that this mere dawn of alarm was

a comparatively human chill.

The most singular part of it, in fact, singular, as the rest had been, was the part I became,

in the hall, aware of in meeting Mrs. Krause.

This picture comes back to me in the general train, the impression, as I received it on my

return, of the wide, white-paneled space, bright in the lamplight, and with its portraits

and red carpet, and of the good-surprised look of my friend, which immediately told me

she had missed me.

It came to me straight away, under her contact, that with plain hardiness, mere relieved anxiety

at my appearance, she knew nothing whatever that could bear upon the incident I had there

ready for her.

I had not suspected in advance that her comfortable face would pull me up, and I somehow measured

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