iration.
Miller's heart fairly bounded at the thought. If the thief could enter
now, he could have entered before,--the night of the dinner. By Jove!
Did he not recall that sudden gust of cold air that swept from the hall
in the midst of the doctor's story? Click, click, snap! At it again,
and no mistake this time. Quickly and on tiptoe the major stole toward
the hall where he could see the front door. It was his hope, his belief
now, that the thief would speedily effect an entrance; and from the
darkness of his lair the major could see and identify him, let him in,
follow him on tiptoe to the dining-room, there seize and confound him
in the very act, and so, fastening the crime on some one guilty man,
dispel at once and for all the cloud of suspicion that hovered over a
woman's fair fame. Click, click, again. What was the matter? Would the
stubborn lock not yield? or was this a 'prentice hand, and his tools
unsuited to the job? In his wild impatience he could have rushed to the
door and hurled it open, but that would have only spoiled the game. He
could have caught his prowler, but proved nothing. No, patience!
patience! A burst of jolly Ethiopian laughter from the distant kitchen
drowned for a moment other sounds and possibly unnerved the operator at
the door. Did he hear quick, light footsteps hurrying away? There was a
broad "stoop" there, quite a wide veranda in fact, since the unsightly
wooden storm-door had been removed. For an instant he certainly thought
he heard scurrying footfalls. Not the steps themselves, but the creak
of the dry woodwork underneath them. He listened intently another
moment, but the attempt had apparently been abandoned.

Then--there it was again. Surely he heard a light footfall on the
steps,--on the piazza itself. He could bear the suspense no longer,
and, springing into the hall where the hanging lamp shed its broad
glare over every object, hurled open the door,--and recoiled in
mingling agony and horror. God of heaven! There stood Fanny Forrest!

"Major Miller!" she gasped, affrighted at his vehemence and the ghastly
look with which he greeted her. "How--how you startled me! Why, what
has happened? where were you going in such--why, major--what is the
matter?" and now there was something imperious in the demand.

For all answer he could only pass his hand over his quivering face in a
dazed, dumb sort of way a moment. Then, rallying suddenly, he stepped
forward, giving his head a shake