keys in her pocket, and the candle in her
hand.

On passing the entrance to the corridor on the bedroom floor, she
stopped and listened. No sound of snoring, no shuffling of infirm
footsteps was to be heard on the other side of the screen. She looked
round it distrustfully. The stone passage was a solitude, and the
truckle-bed was empty. Her own eyes had shown her old Mazey on his way
to the upper regions, more than an hour since, with a candle in his
hand. Had he taken advantage of his master's absence to enjoy the
unaccustomed luxury of sleeping in a room? As the thought occurred to
her, a sound from the further end of the corridor just caught her ear.
She softly advanced toward it, and heard through the door of the last
and remotest of the spare bed-chambers the veteran's lusty snoring in
the room inside. The discovery was startling, in more senses than one.
It deepened the impenetrable mystery of the truckle-bed; for it showed
plainly that old Mazey had no barbarous preference of his own for
passing his nights in the corridor; he occupied that strange and
comfortless sleeping-place purely and entirely on his master's account.

It was no time for dwelling on the reflections which this conclusion
might suggest. Magdalen retraced her steps along the passage, and
descended to the first floor. Passing the doors nearest to her, she
tried the library first. On the staircase and in the corridors she had
felt her heart throbbing fast with an unutterable fear; but a sense of
security returned to her when she found herself within the four walls of
the room, and when she had closed the door on the ghostly quiet outside.

The first lock she tried was the lock of the table-drawer. None of the
keys fitted it. Her next experiment was made on the cabinet. Would the
second attempt fail, like the first?

No! One of the keys fitted; one of the keys, with a little patient
management, turned the lock. She looked in eagerly. There were open
shelves above, and one long drawer under them. The shelves were devoted
to specimens of curious minerals, neatly labeled and arranged. The
drawer was divided into compartments. Two of the compartments contained
papers. In the first, she discovered nothing but a collection of
receipted bills. In the second, she found a heap of business documents;
but the writing, yellow with age, was enough of itself to warn her that
the Trust was not there. She shut the doors of the cabinet, and, after
locking the