and books torn from their bindings. As Magdalen turned to leave
the shed, after one careless glance round her at the lumber that it
contained, her foot struck something on the ground which tinkled against
a fragment of china lying near it. She stooped, and discovered that the
tinkling substance was a rusty key.

She picked up the key and looked at it. She walked out into the air, and
considered a little. More old forgotten keys were probably lying about
among the lumber in the sheds. What if she collected all she could find,
and tried them, one after another, in the locks of the cabinets and
cupboards now closed against her? Was there chance enough that any one
of them might fit to justify her in venturing on the experiment? If the
locks at St. Crux were as old-fashioned as the furniture--if there were
no protective niceties of modern invention to contend against--there was
chance enough beyond all question. Who could say whether the very key
in her hand might not be the lost duplicate of one of the keys on the
admiral's bunch? In the dearth of all other means of finding the way to
her end, the risk was worth running. A flash of the old spirit sparkled
in her weary eyes as she turned and re-entered the shed.

Half an hour more brought her to the limits of the time which she could
venture to allow herself in the open air. In that interval she had
searched the sheds from first to last, and had found five more keys.
"Five more chances!" she thought to herself, as she hid the keys, and
hastily returned to the house.

After first reporting herself in the housekeeper's room, she went
upstairs to remove her bonnet and shawl; taking that opportunity to hide
the keys in her bed-chamber until night came. They were crusted thick
with rust and dirt; but she dared not attempt to clean them until
bed-time secluded her from the prying eyes of the servants in the
solitude of her room.

When the dinner hour brought her, as usual, into personal contact with
the admiral, she was at once struck by a change in him. For the first
time in her experience the old gentleman was silent and depressed.
He ate less than usual, and he hardly said five words to her from the
beginning of the meal to the end. Some unwelcome subject of reflection
had evidently fixed itself on his mind, and remained there persistently,
in spite of his efforts to shake it off. At intervals through the
evening, she wondered with an ever-growing perplexity what the subje