see the stretches of sand, and here and there
the long creeks of salt water. As he came nearer to the house, the smell
of the sea grew stronger, the tops of the trees were more bowed than
ever, sand was blown everywhere across the hopeless flower-beds. The
house itself, suddenly revealed, was a grim weather-beaten structure,
built on the very edge of a queer, barrow-like tongue of land which
ended with the house itself. The sea was breaking on the few yards of
beach sheer below the windows. To his right was a walled garden, some
lawns and greenhouses; to the left, stables, a garage, and two or three
labourer's cottages. At the front door another soldier was stationed
doing sentry duty. He stood on one side, however, and allowed Granet to
ring the bell.

"Officers quartered here?" Granet inquired.

"Only one, sir," the man replied.

The door was opened almost immediately by a woman-servant. She did not
wait for Granet to announce himself but motioned him to follow her into
a large, circular, stone hall, across which she led him quickly and
threw open the door of the drawing-room. Isabel Worth was standing just
inside the room, as though listening. She held out her hand and there
was no doubt about her welcome.

"Captain Granet," she said almost in a whisper, "of course you'll
think we are all mad, but would you mind coming upstairs into my little
sitting-room?"

"Of course not," Granet acquiesced. "I'll come anywhere, with pleasure.
What a view you have from here!"

He glanced through the high windows at the other end of the room. She
laid her fingers upon his arm and led him towards the door.

"Quietly, please," she whispered. "Try and imagine that you are in a
house of conspirators."

She led him up the quaint stone staircase, spiral-shaped, to the first
floor. Arrived there, she paused to listen for a moment, then breathed
a little more freely and led him to a small sitting-room at the end of
a long passage. It was a pleasant little apartment and looked sheer out
over the sea. She threw herself down upon a sofa with a sigh of relief,
and pointed to a chair.

"Do sit down, Captain Granet," she begged. "I am really not in the least
insane but father is. You know, I got back on Wednesday night and was
met at once with stern orders that no visitors of any sort were to be
received, that the tradespeople were to be interviewed at the front
gates--in fact that the house was to be in a state of siege."

Granet ap