ng brokenly on the carpet. Let us then not
express any surprise at the sudden collapse of one of the world's
greatest female thinkers. As the meaning of this speech smote on Mrs.
Horace Hignett's understanding, she sank weeping into a chair. The
ever-present fear that had haunted her had been exorcised. Windles was
hers in perpetuity. The relief was too great. She sat in her chair and
gulped; and Eustace, greatly encouraged, emerged slowly from the
bedclothes like a worm after a thunderstorm.

How long this poignant scene would have lasted, one cannot say. It is a
pity that it was cut short, for I should have liked to dwell upon it.
But at this moment, from the regions downstairs, there suddenly burst
upon the silent night such a whirlwind of sound as effectually
dissipated the tense emotion in the room. Somebody appeared to have
touched off the orchestrion in the drawing-room, and that willing
instrument had begun again in the middle of a bar at the point where
Jane Hubbard had switched it off four afternoons ago. Its wailing lament
for the passing of Summer filled the whole house.

"That's too bad!" said Jane, a little annoyed. "At this time of night!"

"It's the burglars!" quavered Mrs. Hignett. In the stress of recent
events she had completely forgotten the existence of those enemies of
Society. "They were dancing in the hall when I arrived, and now they're
playing the orchestrion!"

"Light-hearted chaps!" said Eustace, admiring the sang-froid of the
criminal world. "Full of spirits!"

"This won't do," said Jane Hubbard, shaking her head. "We can't have
this sort of thing. I'll go and fetch my gun."

"They'll murder you, dear!" panted Mrs. Hignett, clinging to her arm.

Jane Hubbard laughed.

"Murder _me_!" she said amusedly. "I'd like to catch them at it!"

Mrs. Hignett stood staring at the door as Jane closed it softly behind
her.

"Eustace," she said solemnly, "that is a wonderful girl!"

"Yes! She once killed a panther--or a puma, I forget which--with a
hat-pin!" said Eustace with enthusiasm.

"I could wish you no better wife!" said Mrs. Hignett.

She broke off with a sharp wail. Out in the passage something like a
battery of artillery had roared.

The door opened and Jane Hubbard appeared, slipping a fresh cartridge
into the elephant-gun.

"One of them was popping about outside here," she announced. "I took a
shot at him, but I'm afraid I missed. The visibility was bad. At any
rate he went aw