erhaps, one day he would kill
someone. But to understand this did not lessen her feeling. Her baby!
Such a tiny thing! She hated him at last; and she lay thinking out the
coldest, the cruellest, the most cutting things to say. She had been too
long-suffering.

But he did not come in that evening; and, too upset to eat or do
anything, she went up to bed at ten o'clock. When she had undressed,
she stole across to the nursery; she had a longing to have the baby
with her--a feeling that to leave her was not safe. She carried her off,
still sleeping, and, locking her doors, got into bed. Having warmed a
nest with her body for the little creature, she laid it there; and then
for a long time lay awake, expecting every minute to hear him return.
She fell asleep at last, and woke with a start. There were vague noises
down below or on the stairs. It must be he! She had left the light on in
her room, and she leaned over to look at the baby's face. It was still
sleeping, drawing its tiny breaths peacefully, little dog-shivers
passing every now and then over its face. Gyp, shaking back her dark
plaits of hair, sat up by its side, straining her ears.

Yes; he WAS coming up, and, by the sounds, he was not sober. She heard a
loud creak, and then a thud, as if he had clutched at the banisters
and fallen; she heard muttering, too, and the noise of boots dropped.
Swiftly the thought went through her: 'If he were quite drunk, he would
not have taken them off at all;--nor if he were quite sober. Does he
know I'm back?' Then came another creak, as if he were raising himself
by support of the banisters, and then--or was it fancy?--she could hear
him creeping and breathing behind the door. Then--no fancy this time--he
fumbled at the door and turned the handle. In spite of his state, he
must know that she was back, had noticed her travelling-coat or seen the
telegram. The handle was tried again, then, after a pause, the handle of
the door between his room and hers was fiercely shaken. She could hear
his voice, too, as she knew it when he was flown with drink, thick, a
little drawling.

"Gyp--let me in--Gyp!"

The blood burned up in her cheeks, and she thought: 'No, my friend;
you're not coming in!'

After that, sounds were more confused, as if he were now at one door,
now at the other; then creakings, as if on the stairs again, and after
that, no sound at all.

For fully half an hour, Gyp continued to sit up, straining her ears.
Where w