avow, she had felt my eyes upon her and made me conscious
that she had so felt them. Now she must believe them removed, and if I
could but gain the glimpse I speak of I should see this woman as she
was.

I thought I could manage this.

I had listened to the maid's steps as she returned up stairs, and I
believed I knew in what direction they had tended after she reached the
floor above. I would just see if one of the windows on the south side
was lighted, and, if so, if it was in any way accessible.

To make my way through the shrubbery without rousing the attention of
any one inside or out required a circumspection that tried me greatly.
But by dint of strong self-control I succeeded in getting to the
vantage-place I sought, without attracting attention or causing a single
window to fly up. This reassured me, and perceiving a square of light in
the dark mass of wall before me I peered about among the trees
overlooking this part of the building for one I could climb without too
much difficulty.

The one which looked most feasible was a maple with low-growing
branches, and throwing off my coat I was soon half-way to its top and on
a level, or nearly so, with the window on which I had fixed my eye.

There were no curtains to this window--the house being half dismantled
in anticipation of Mrs. Carew's departure--but it was still protected by
a shade, and this was drawn down, nearly to the ledge.

But not quite. A narrow space intervened which, to an eye placed where
mine was, offered a peep-hole of more or less satisfactory proportions,
and this space, I soon saw, widened perceptibly from time to time as the
wind caught at the shade and blew it in.

With utmost caution I shifted my position till I could bring my eye
fairly in line with the interior of this room, and finding that the
glimpse given revealed little but a blue wall and some snowy linen, I
waited for the breeze to blow that I might see more.

It came speedily, and in a gust which lifted the shade and thus
disclosed the whole inside of the room. It was an instantaneous glimpse,
but in that moment the picture projected upon my eye satisfied me that,
despite my doubts, despite my causes for suspicion, I had been doing
this woman the greatest injustice in supposing that her relations to the
child she had brought into her home were other than she had made out.

She had come up as she had promised, and had seated herself on the bed
with her face turned towar