of fortune, it might not be. Of course she ran a risk, a
considerable risk of meeting some caretaker or other, and her presence
would not be particularly easy to explain. Curiosity and prudence wavered
momentarily in the balance. Curiosity turned the scale. She tried the
door. Vastly to her delight it yielded at her push. She slipped inside
the house, closing it softly behind her.

She found herself in a long carpeted passage, sporting prints adorning
the walls. She tip-toed down it, her step making no smallest sound on the
soft carpet. The end of the passage brought her into a big square hall.
To her right were wide deep stairs; opposite them was a door, in all
probability the front door; to her left was another door.

Trix recalled the past, rapidly, and in detail. The door to the left must
lead to the library,--that is, if her memory did not play her false. She
remembered the big room, the book-cases reaching from floor to ceiling,
and the man with the black eyes, who had terrified her. Something, some
fleeting shadow, of her old childish fear was upon her now, as she turned
the door handle. The door yielded easily. She pushed it wide open.

The room was shadowed, gloomy almost. The heavy curtains were drawn back
from the windows, but other curtains of some thinnish green material hung
before them, curtains which effectually blotted out any view from the
window, or view into the room from without. Before her were the old
remembered book-cases, filled with dark, rather fusty books.

Trix pushed the door to behind her, and turned, nonchalantly, to look
around the room. As she looked her heart jumped, leapt, and then stood
still.

CHAPTER XXII

AN OLD MAN IN A LIBRARY

A white-haired man was watching her. He was sitting in a big oak chair,
his hands resting on the arms.

"Oh!" ejaculated Trix. And further expression failed her.

"Please don't let me disturb you," came a suave, courteous old voice.
"You were looking for something perhaps?"

"I only wanted to see the library," stuttered Trix, flabbergasted,
dismayed.

"Well, this is the library. May I ask how you found your way in?"

"Through a door," responded Trix, voicing the obvious.

"Ah! I did not know visitors were being admitted to the house?" This on a
note of interrogation, flavoured with the faintest hint of irony, though
the courtesy was still not lacking.

Trix coloured.

"I wasn't admitted," she owned. "I just came."

"Ah, I see,