"Time is of importance;
I must make sure of the chaise. If Mrs. Wragge comes in, tell her
nothing--she is not sharp enough to be trusted. If she presumes to ask
questions, extinguish her immediately. You have only to be loud. Pray
take my authority into your own hands, and be as loud with Mrs. Wragge
as I am!" He snatched up his tall hat, bowed, smiled, and tripped out of
the room.

Sensible of little else but of the relief of being alone; feeling no
more distinct impression than the vague sense of some serious change
having taken place in herself and her position, Magdalen let the events
of the morning come and go like shadows on her mind, and waited wearily
for what the day might bring forth. After the lapse of some time, the
door opened softly. The giant figure of Mrs. Wragge stalked into the
room, and stopped opposite Magdalen in solemn astonishment.

"Where are your Things?" asked Mrs. Wragge, with a burst of
incontrollable anxiety. "I've been upstairs looking in your drawers.
Where are your night-gowns and night-caps? and your petticoats and
stockings? and your hair-pins and bear's grease, and all the rest of
it?"

"My luggage is left at the railway station," said Magdalen.

Mrs. Wragge's moon-face brightened dimly. The ineradicable female
instinct of Curiosity tried to sparkle in her faded blue eyes--flickered
piteously--and died out.

"How much luggage?" she asked, confidentially. "The captain's gone out.
Let's go and get it!"

"Mrs. Wragge!" cried a terrible voice at the door.

For the first time in Magdalen's experience, Mrs. Wragge was deaf to the
customary stimulant. She actually ventured on a feeble remonstrance in
the presence of her husband.

"Oh, do let her have her Things!" pleaded Mrs. Wragge. "Oh, poor soul,
do let her have her Things!"

The captain's inexorable forefinger pointed to a corner of the
room--dropped slowly as his wife retired before it--and suddenly stopped
at the region of her shoes.

"Do I hear a clapping on the floor!" exclaimed Captain Wragge, with an
expression of horror. "Yes; I do. Down at heel again! The left shoe
this time. Pull it up, Mrs. Wragge! pull it up!--The chaise will be here
to-morrow morning at nine o'clock," he continued, addressing Magdalen.
"We can't possibly venture on claiming your box. There is note-paper.
Write down a list of the necessaries you want. I will take it myself
to the shop, pay the bill for you, and bring back the parcel. We must
sacri