The autumn moon, nearly at
full, had risen and was shining into the great windows. And in front of
the furthest window she perceived in the radiance of the moonshine a
pyramidal group, somewhat in the style of a family of acrobats,
dangerously arranged on the stage of a music-hall. The base of the
pyramid comprised two settees; upon these were several arm-chairs laid
flat, and on the arm-chairs two tables covered with cushions and rugs;
lastly, in the way of inanimate nature, two gilt chairs. On the gilt
chairs was something that unmistakably moved, and was fumbling with the
top of the window. Being a stout woman with a tranquil and sagacious
mind, her first act was not to drop the lamp. She courageously clung to
the lamp.

"Who's there?" said a voice from the apex of the pyramid.

Then a subsidence began, followed by a crash and a multitudinous
splintering of glass. The living form dropped on to one of the settees,
rebounding like a football from its powerful springs. There was a hole
as big as a coffin in the window. The living form collected itself, and
then jumped wildly through that hole into the gardens.

Denry ran. The moment had not struck him as a moment propitious for
explanation. In a flash he had seen the ridiculousness of endeavouring
to convince a stout lady in black that he was a gentleman paying a call
on the Countess. He simply scrambled to his legs and ran. He ran
aimlessly in the darkness and sprawled over a hedge, after crossing
various flower-beds. Then he saw the sheen of the moon on Sneyd Lake,
and he could take his bearings. In winter all the Five Towns skate on
Sneyd Lake if the ice will bear, and the geography of it was quite
familiar to Denry. He skirted its east bank, plunged into Great Shendon
Wood, and emerged near Great Shendon Station, on the line from Stafford
to Knype. He inquired for the next train in the tones of innocency, and
in half an hour was passing through Sneyd Station itself. In another
fifty minutes he was at home. The clock showed ten-fifteen. His mother's
cottage seemed amazingly small. He said that he had been detained in
Hanbridge on business, that he had had neither tea nor supper, and that
he was hungry. Next morning he could scarcely be sure that his visit to
Sneyd Hall was not a dream. In any event, it had been a complete
failure.

V

It was on this untriumphant morning that one of the tenants under his
control, calling at the cottage to pay some rent overdue