ew minutes, or ages later--she could not tell--that suddenly
she heard a door bang violently--once--twice? She heard a hurried step
on the gravel below her window, and then a shout, and the sound of a
horse galloping faster and faster into the distance. Then even the
echo died away, and silence as of the dead remained. She strained her
ears, shivering with nervousness and fatigue, but could hear no more,
and after a while she sank into a troubled sleep.

CHAPTER IV

FRANCIS

"The eternal landscape of the past."--TENNYSON.

The next morning Philippa rose late and had breakfast in her own room.
The night had brought no counsel, she was undecided as to the line of
action she should take, and physically weary. She felt it impossible
to ask questions of her maid, who might have gained information in the
housekeeper's room; equally impossible to summon Ford the butler,
excellent and confidential servant as he appeared to be. It was not a
subject upon which she could touch, however distantly, with a
subordinate. It had affected her too deeply, and yet she must know
more.

She had no doubt but that the woman she had seen could enlighten her
fully, but she was ignorant of her position in the house, and even had
this not been the case, she shrank from demanding anything from one so
obviously hostile to her.

She could not forget that she had made a definite promise to return;
she wondered now how she could have done so, and yet at the time it had
been impossible to deny the insistent appeal. She would keep that
promise--on so much she was determined--but as to the manner of keeping
it she could not tell.

Finally, a desire to be out of the house and under the open sky
overcame her. She would go for a walk, and perhaps on her return
something would guide her as to her next move.

Accompanied by her maid, who appeared to have mastered the topography
of the corridors, she descended to the hall, and then she realised her
mistake of the previous evening. Marion's instructions had been to
turn twice to the right, a movement easy and successful this morning,
but of course in ascending to her room the direction was reversed, and
she should have turned twice to the left. A simple mistake, out of all
proportion to the events which had followed upon it.

"I knew I should lose my way last night, miss," said Walker. "Them
backstairs is bewildering; but I thought to myself, I'll be even with
them somehow, so I