re it not for that tell-tale light behind.

"Good heaven!" gasped Bertha, "it is a burglar."

But her sister set her mouth grimly and shook her head. "We shall see,"
she whispered. "It may be something worse."

Swiftly and furtively the man stood suddenly erect, and began to push
the window slowly up. Then he put one knee upon the sash, glanced round
to see that all was safe, and climbed over into the room. As he did so
he had to push the blind aside. Then the two spectators saw where the
light came from. Mrs. Westmacott was standing, as rigid as a statue, in
the center of the room, with a lighted taper in her right hand. For an
instant they caught a glimpse of her stern face and her white collar.
Then the blind fell back into position, and the two figures disappeared
from their view.

"Oh, that dreadful woman!" cried Monica. "That dreadful, dreadful woman!
She was waiting for him. You saw it with your own eyes, sister Bertha!"

"Hush, dear, hush and listen!" said her more charitable companion.
They pushed their own window up once more, and watched from behind the
curtains.

For a long time all was silent within the house. The light still
stood motionless as though Mrs. Westmacott remained rigidly in the one
position, while from time to time a shadow passed in front of it to show
that her midnight visitor was pacing up and down in front of her. Once
they saw his outline clearly, with his hands outstretched as if in
appeal or entreaty. Then suddenly there was a dull sound, a cry, the
noise of a fall, the taper was extinguished, and a dark figure fled in
the moonlight, rushed across the garden, and vanished amid the shrubs at
the farther side.

Then only did the two old ladies understand that they had looked on
whilst a tragedy had been enacted. "Help!" they cried, and "Help!" in
their high, thin voices, timidly at first, but gathering volume as they
went on, until the Wilderness rang with their shrieks. Lights shone
in all the windows opposite, chains rattled, bars were unshot, doors
opened, and out rushed friends to the rescue. Harold, with a stick; the
Admiral, with his sword, his grey head and bare feet protruding from
either end of a long brown ulster; finally, Doctor Walker, with a poker,
all ran to the help of the Westmacotts. Their door had been already
opened, and they crowded tumultuously into the front room.

Charles Westmacott, white to his lips, was kneeling an the floor,
supporting his aunt's head u