came over her. She turned and
did what she had never in her life done before, and what she had
never heard of anyone else doing in a kitchen. She bolted the door.

But, having done this, finding herself at last alone, shut off from
everybody, she was still beset by a strange, uncanny dread. She
felt as if she were locked in with an invisible presence, which
mocked and jeered, reproached and threatened her, by turns.

Why had she allowed, nay encouraged, Daisy to go away for two days?
Daisy, at any rate, was company--kind, young, unsuspecting company.
With Daisy she could be her old sharp self. It was such a comfort
to be with someone to whom she not only need, but ought to, say
nothing. When with Bunting she was pursued by a sick feeling of
guilt, of shame. She was the man's wedded wife--in his stolid way
he was very kind to her, and yet she was keeping from him something
he certainly had a right to know.

Not for worlds, however, would she have told Bunting of her dreadful
suspicion--nay, of her almost certainty.

At last she went across to the door and unlocked it. Then she went
upstairs and turned out her bedroom. That made her feel a little
better.

She longed for Bunting to return, and yet in a way she was relieved
by his absence. She would have liked to feel him near by, and yet
she welcomed anything that took her husband out of the house.

And as Mrs. Bunting swept and dusted, trying to put her whole mind
into what she was doing, she was asking herself all the time what
was going on upstairs.

What a good rest the lodger was having! But there, that was only
natural. Mr. Sleuth, as she well knew, had been up a long time last
night, or rather this morning.

******

Suddenly, the drawing-room bell rang. But Mr. Sleuth's landlady did
not go up, as she generally did, before getting ready the simple meal
which was the lodger's luncheon and breakfast combined. Instead, she
went downstairs again and hurriedly prepared the lodger's food.

Then, very slowly, with her heart beating queerly, she walked up, and
just outside the sitting-room--for she felt sure that Mr. Sleuth had
got up, that he was there already, waiting for her--she rested the
tray on the top of the banisters and listened. For a few moments she
heard nothing; then through the door came the high, quavering voice
with which she had become so familiar:

"'She saith to him, stolen waters are sweet, and bread eaten in
secret is pleasant. But he kno