e called him."

"Well, he never seemed so to me," said Bunting stoutly. "He simply
seemed to me 'centric--that's all he did. Not a bit madder than
many I could tell you of." He was walking round the room restlessly,
but he stopped short at last. "And what d'you think we ought to do
now?"

Mrs. Bunting shook her head impatiently. "I don't think we ought
to do nothing," she said. "Why should we?"

And then again he began walking round the room in an aimless fashion
that irritated her.

"If only I could put out a bit of supper for him somewhere where he
would get it! And his money, too? I hate to feel it's in there."

"Don't you make any mistake--he'll come back for that," said Bunting,
with decision.

But Mrs. Bunting shook her head. She knew better. "Now," she said,
"you go off up to bed. It's no use us sitting up any longer."

And Bunting acquiesced.

She ran down and got him a bedroom candle--there was no gas in the
little back bedroom upstairs. And then she watched him go slowly up.

Suddenly he turned and came down again. "Ellen," he said, in an
urgent whisper, "if I was you I'd take the chain off the door, and
I'd lock myself in--that's what I'm going to do. Then he can sneak
in and take his dirty money away."

Mrs. Bunting neither nodded nor shook her head. Slowly she went
downstairs, and there she carried out half of Bunting's advice.
She took, that is, the chain off the front door. But she did not
go to bed, neither did she lock herself in. She sat up all night,
waiting. At half-past seven she made herself a cup of tea, and
then she went into her bedroom.

Daisy opened her eyes.

"Why, Ellen," she said, "I suppose I was that tired, and slept so
sound, that I never heard you come to bed or get up--funny,
wasn't it?"

"Young people don't sleep as light as do old folks," Mrs. Bunting
said sententiously.

"Did the lodger come in after all? I suppose he's upstairs now?"

Mrs. Bunting shook her head. "It looks as if 'twould be a fine
day for you down at Richmond," she observed in a kindly tone.

And Daisy smiled, a very happy, confident little smile.

******

That evening Mrs. Bunting forced herself to tell young Chandler
that their lodger had, so to speak, disappeared. She and Bunting
had thought carefully over what they would say, and so well did
they carry out their programme, or, what is more likely, so full
was young Chandler of the long happy day he and Daisy had spent
together, that he