ings. There was a large heavy knocker on the green door, and
though Mr. Dempster carried a latch-key, he sometimes chose to use the
knocker. He chose to do so now. The thunder resounded through Orchard
Street, and, after a single minute, there was a second clap louder than
the first. Another minute, and still the door was not opened; whereupon
Mr. Dempster, muttering, took out his latch-key, and, with less
difficulty than might have been expected, thrust it into the door. When
he opened the door the passage was dark.

'Janet!' in the loudest rasping tone, was the next sound that rang
through the house.

'Janet!' again--before a slow step was heard on the stairs, and a distant
light began to flicker on the wall of the passage.

'Curse you! you creeping idiot! Come faster, can't you?'

Yet a few seconds, and the figure of a tall woman, holding aslant a
heavy-plated drawing-room candlestick, appeared at the turning of the
passage that led to the broader entrance.

She had on a light dress which sat loosely about her figure, but did not
disguise its liberal, graceful outline. A heavy mass of straight
jet-black hair had escaped from its fastening, and hung over her
shoulders. Her grandly-cut features, pale with the natural paleness of a
brunette, had premature lines about them, telling that the years had been
lengthened by sorrow, and the delicately-curved nostril, which seemed
made to quiver with the proud consciousness of power and beauty, must
have quivered to the heart-piercing griefs which had given that worn look
to the corners of the mouth. Her wide open black eyes had a strangely
fixed, sightless gaze, as she paused at the turning, and stood silent
before her husband.

'I'll teach you to keep me waiting in the dark, you pale staring fool!'
he said, advancing with his slow drunken step. 'What, you've been
drinking again, have you? I'll beat you into your senses.'

He laid his hand with a firm grip on her shoulder, turned her round, and
pushed her slowly before him along the passage and through the
dining-room door, which stood open on their left hand.

There was a portrait of Janet's mother, a grey-haired, dark-eyed old
woman, in a neatly fluted cap, hanging over the mantelpiece. Surely the
aged eyes take on a look of anguish as they see Janet--not trembling, no!
it would be better if she trembled--standing stupidly unmoved in her
great beauty while the heavy arm is lifted to strike her. The blow falls
--anot