the conversation ceased.

Passing out of the kitchen regions, Mary glanced towards a distant
window, hesitated, and then came to another decision. Mr. Carrington
must surely have left the garden now, so there was no harm in peeping
out. She went to the window and peeped.

It was only a two minutes' peep, for Mr. Carrington had not left the
garden, and at the end of that space of time something very disturbing
happened. But it was long enough to make her marvel greatly at her
sympathetic friend's method of solving the riddle of the master's
conduct. When she first saw him, he seemed to be smoothing the earth in
one of the flower beds with his foot. Then he moved on a few paces,
stopped, and drove his walking stick hard into the bed. She saw him lean
on it to get it further in and apparently twist it about a little. And
then he withdrew it again and was in the act of smoothing the place when
she saw him glance sharply towards the gate, and the next instant leap
behind a bush. Simultaneously the hum of a motor car fell on her ear,
and Mary was out of the room and speeding upstairs.

She heard the car draw up before the house and listened for the front
door bell, but the door opened without a ring and she marvelled and
trembled afresh. That the master should return in a car at this hour of
the morning seemed surely to be connected with the sin she had connived
at. It swelled into a crime as she held her breath and listened. She
wished devoutly she had never set eyes on the insinuating Mr.
Carrington.

But there came no call for her, or no ringing of any bell; merely sounds
of movement in the hall below, heard through the thrumming of the
waiting car. And then the front door opened and shut again and she
ventured to the window. It was a little open and she could hear her
master speak to the chauffeur as he got in. He was now wearing, she
noticed, a heavy overcoat. A moment more and he was off again, down the
drive, and out through the gates. When she remembered to look again for
her sympathetic friend, he was quietly driving his walking stick once
more into a flower bed.

About ten minutes afterwards the front door bell rang and there stood
Mr. Carrington again. His eye seemed strangely bright, she thought, but
his manner was calm and soothing as ever.

"I noticed Mr. Rattar return," he said, "and I thought I would like to
make sure that it was all right, before I left. I trust, Mary, that you
have got into no trouble