rs. One led into the passage, and the other communicated with the
Blue bedroom. This latter door was ajar just a couple of inches, and
through the opening came the sound of a drawer pulled out. For a moment
Carmel thought that Dulcie and Bertha must have come upstairs, and she
was on the point of calling to them, when some strong and mysterious
instinct restrained her. Instead, she walked softly across the floor,
and peeped through the chink. It was no cousin or schoolfellow who was
in the next room, but a slight fair man--an utter stranger--who was
hastily turning over the contents of the drawer, and slipping something
into his pocket.

For a moment Carmel's heart stood still. She realized instantly that she
was in the immediate vicinity of a burglar. Seeing the entertainment
advertised by a placard on the gate, he must have entered the garden and
waited his opportunity to slip into the house while everybody was
outside watching the performance. He was apparently laying light fingers
upon any article which took his fancy.

Carmel's first and most natural impulse was to tear downstairs and give
warning of what was happening. Then it occurred to her that while she
did so the thief would very possibly make his escape. If only she could
trap him. But how? Her fertile brain thought for a second or two, then
evolved a plan.

Very quietly she withdrew the key from the door which led out of her
bedroom to the passage, and locked it on the outside. So far, so good:
if Mr. Burglar went into the dressing-room he could not escape. Now she
must be prepared to take a great risk. The key of the Blue bedroom was
on the inside; she must open the door, withdraw it, and lock it on the
outside before the thief could stop her. It was possible that he had
calculated on the double exit, and that, hearing a noise behind him, he
would make a dash for the dressing-room.

With shaking legs, and something going round and round like a wheel
inside her chest, she approached the Blue bedroom door, and opened it
softly. As she had anticipated, the intruder had probably laid his
plans, for at the first sound he turned his head, then slipped like a
rabbit into the dressing-room. No doubt an unpleasant surprise awaited
him there, for as Carmel's trembling fingers drew out the key, and
locked the door from the passage side she could hear the handle of her
own bedroom door moving.

"He's probably got skeleton keys, or a jemmy, or something like they