rusquely.

She made no further effort. That glance seemed to have subdued her
spirit.

"I am sorry I have bothered you," she said as she went.

As the door closed behind her, Mr. Rattar took out his handkerchief and
wiped his brow and his neck. And then he fell to work again upon the
recent records of the firm. Yet, absorbed though he seemed, whenever a
door opened or shut sharply or a step sounded distinctly outside his
room, he would look up quickly and listen, or that expression would come
into his eye which both Mary MacLean and Mr. Ison had described as the
look of one who was watched.

VI

AT NIGHT

When Simon Rattar came to his present villa, he brought from his old
house in the middle of the town (which had been his father's before him)
a vast accumulation of old books and old papers. Being a man who never
threw away an opportunity or anything else, and also a person of the
utmost tidyness, he compromised by keeping this litter in the spare
rooms at the top of the house. In fact Simon was rather pleased at
discovering this use for his superfluous apartments, for he hated
wasting anything.

On this same morning, just before he started for his office, he had
again called his housemaid and given her particular injunctions that
these rooms were not to be disturbed during the day. He added that this
was essential because he expected a gentleman that evening who would be
going through some of the old papers with him.

Perhaps it was the vague feeling of disquiet which possessed Mary
MacLean this morning that made his injunction seem a little curious.
She had been with the master three years and never presumed or dreamt
of presuming to touch his papers. He might have known that, thought
she, without having to tell her not to. Indeed, she felt a little
aggrieved at the command, and in the course of the morning she made a
discovery that seemed to her a further reflection on her discretion.

When she came to dust the passage in which these rooms opened her eye
was at once caught by a sheet of white paper pinned to each of the three
doors. On each of these sheets was written in her master's hand the
words "This room not to be entered. Papers to be undisturbed." The
result was a warning to those who take superfluous precautions. Under
ordinary circumstances Mary would never have thought of touching the
handles of those doors. Now, she looked at them for a few moments and
then tried the handle nearest to