could be no
lack of conviction in my voice.

Indeed, there was no cause for such lack. She also stood for a little
while stone-still, and I was beginning to expand to the rapture which was
in store for me when she should take me again in her arms.

But there was no such moment of softness. All at once she started as if
she had suddenly wakened from a dream, and on the spur of the moment
said:

"Now go, go!" I felt the conviction of necessity to obey, and turned at
once. As I moved towards the door by which I had entered, I asked:

"When shall I see you again?"

"Soon!" came her answer. "I shall let you know soon--when and where.
Oh, go, go!" She almost pushed me from her.

When I had passed through the low doorway and locked and barred it behind
me, I felt a pang that I should have had to shut her out like that; but I
feared lest there should arise some embarrassing suspicion if the door
should be found open. Later came the comforting thought that, as she had
got to the roof though the door had been shut, she would be able to get
away by the same means. She had evidently knowledge of some secret way
into the Castle. The alternative was that she must have some
supernatural quality or faculty which gave her strange powers. I did not
wish to pursue that train of thought, and so, after an effort, shut it
out from my mind.

When I got back to my room I locked the door behind me, and went to sleep
in the dark. I did not want light just then--could not bear it.

This morning I woke, a little later than usual, with a kind of
apprehension which I could not at once understand. Presently, however,
when my faculties became fully awake and in working order, I realized
that I feared, half expected, that Aunt Janet would come to me in a worse
state of alarm than ever apropos of some new Second-Sight experience of
more than usual ferocity.

But, strange to say, I had no such visit. Later on in the morning, when,
after breakfast, we walked together through the garden, I asked her how
she had slept, and if she had dreamt. She answered me that she had slept
without waking, and if she had had any dreams, they must have been
pleasant ones, for she did not remember them. "And you know, Rupert,"
she added, "that if there be anything bad or fearsome or warning in
dreams, I always remember them."

Later still, when I was by myself on the cliff beyond the creek, I could
not help commenting on the absence of her power o