't think it was a ghost," he repeated, lowering his voice. "I
don't think he is dead."

She did not speak; she only sat looking up at him with that white, still
face.

"There is no need of your wearing a widow's weeds, Agnes," he said,
touching her black dress; "I believe your husband to be alive."

She never spoke. If her life had depended on it, she could not have
uttered a word--could not have removed her eyes from his face.

"I have no positive proof of what I say, but a conviction that is equal
to any proof in my own mind. I believe your husband to be alive--I
believe him to be an inmate of this very house."

He stopped in alarm. She had fallen back in her chair, the bluish pallor
of death overspreading her face.

"I should have prepared you better," he said. "The shock was too sudden.
Shall I go for a glass of water?"

She made a slight motion in the negative, and whispered the word,

"Wait!"

A few moments' struggle with her fluttering breath, and then she was
able to sit up.

"Are you better again? Shall I go for the water?"

"No, no! Tell me--"

She could not finish the sentence.

"I have no positive proof," said Doctor Danton, "but the strongest
internal conviction. I believe your husband to be in hiding in this
house. I believe you saw him that night, and no spirit."

"Go on, go on!" she gasped.

"You have heard of Mr. Richards, the invalid, shut upstairs, have you
not? Yes. Well, that mysterious individual is your husband."

She rose up and stood by him, white as death.

"Are you sure?"

"Morally, yes. As I told you, I have no proof as yet and I should not
have told you so soon had I not seen you dying by inches before my eyes.
Can you keep up heart now, little despondent?"

She clasped her hands over that wildly-throbbing heart, still not quite
sure that she heard aright.

"You are to keep all this a profound secret," said the Doctor, "until I
can make my suspicions certainties. They say women cannot keep a
secret--is it true?"

"I will do whatever you tell me. Oh, thank Heaven! thank Heaven for
this!"

She had found her voice, and the hysterics threatened again. Doctor
Danton held up an authoritative finger.

"Don't!" he said imperatively. "I won't have it! No more crying, or I
shall take back all I have said. Tell a woman good news, and she cries;
tell her bad news, and she does the same. How is a man to manage them?"

He walked across the room, and looked out at the night,