comfortable
sensation. And presently the sensation became more definite; became
localized; and she was aware that she was growing hungry. And in the
same moment came the dismaying realization that, in their haste of
the night before, she had not thought to plan with Matilda for the
somewhat essential item of food!

She sat up. What was she ever to do? Three months of solitary
confinement, with no arrangements for food! Would Matilda have the
sense to think of this, and if so would she have the adroitness to
smuggle edibles in to her unnoticed? Or was she to be starved out?

The revised plan had lost its first rose-tint.

She got up, and noiselessly foraged throughout her quarters. The total
of her gleaning was a box of forgotten chocolate bon-bons and a box of
half-length tallow candles. She had read that Esquimaux ate tallow, or
its equivalent, and prospered famously upon it; but she deferred the
candles in favor of the bon-bons, and breakfasted on half the box.

Then she went back to bed and read. In the afternoon she ate the
second half of the bon-bons.

Also in the afternoon she discovered that the bliss of lying abed,
which she had thought would be exhaustless, had inexplicably become
transmitted into boredom. And yet she dared not move about, save with
a caution that amounted almost to pain; for she had heard Jack and
Mary and Mr. Pyecroft pass and re-pass her door, and she knew that any
slight noise on her part might result in disastrous betrayal.

Evening drew on. Bed, and sitting noiseless in one spot, grew more
wearisome. And her stomach began to complain bitterly, for as has been
remarked it was a pampered creature and had been long accustomed to
being served sumptuously and with deferential promptitude. But she
realized that Matilda would not dare come, if she remembered to come
at all, until the household was fast asleep.

Eight o'clock came. She lit one of the candles and placed it,
cautiously shaded, in a corner of her sitting-room....

Ten o'clock came.

She looked meditatively at the box of candles. Perhaps the Esquimaux
ate them with a kind of sauce. They might not be so bad that way....

Midnight came. Shortly thereafter a faint, ever so faint, knocking
sent her tiptoeing--for months she would dare move only on breathless
tiptoe!--to the door of her sitting-room, where she stood and
listened.

Again the faint knocking sounded.

"Mrs. De Peyster, it's Matilda," whispered an agitated voic