THE SECRETARY GOES HOME
He was chilled to the bone when he awoke, an hour and a half later. The room was in pitchy darkness. It is only natural to suppose that he did not know where he was. He felt of himself, surprised to find that he was not undressed and not in bed. With more philosophy than is usually exhibited under such puzzling conditions, he fell back in his chair and forced himself into full wakefulness.
A moment later, with a gasp of dismay, he was on his feet, scraping away the frost and peering from the black window into the night, his eyes wide with anxiety. His arms and legs were stiff with the cold; he found himself shivering as with a mighty chill. Turning his back to the window, for many minutes he stared dumbly into the opaqueness before him. The house was as black as the grave and quite as silent. He began to experience, strangely enough, the same dread of darkness he had felt when a boy.
A furnace register, he remembered, was near the door leading to the hall, wherever that might be. His first thought was to seek the comfort of its friendly, warmth-giving drafts. On second thoughts, he ransacked his pockets for a match. A clock in the hall struck once, but how was he to know whether it signified one o'clock or half-past something else? Finding no match, he started for the register, his hands stretched before him.
Of one thing he was reasonably sure; the household was wrapped in slumber. There was not a sound in the house. He was reminded of a childhood poem in which it was said: "Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse." The memory of this line brought a smile to his lips.
His progress was rather sharply checked by bodily contact with one of the dummies, whose presence he had quite forgotten. Not only was there a hollow protest from the dummy, but a more substantial one from Mr. Van Pycke. Not content with a mild encounter with this particular obstacle, he proceeded, in his confusion, to back into another, which, being less sturdy, toppled over with a crash that must have been heard in the attic.
Panic-stricken, the young man floundered on, now intent upon reaching the hall and making as dignified an escape as possible before the servants appeared with blunderbusses and tongs. His only desire now was to find his overcoat and hat and the front steps without butting his brains out in the darkness.
He brought up against a chair, creating additional racket and barking his knee into the bargain.
"Good heaven," he muttered, "where am I? Is it a barricade?"
His heart stood still for a second. Distinctly he heard the soft, suppressed cry of a woman—and then the unmistakable sound of scurrying fabrics. The sounds came from some remote corner of the room—or possibly from a room hard by—and were indicative of great alarm on the part of an unseen person.
Bosworth was not a slow thinker. He took the safest way. Without hesitation he called out: "It's all right! I am Bosworth Van Pycke!"
There was dead silence for the next sixty seconds. The French clock ticked them off. He involuntarily counted twenty-five or thirty before a small, hushed voice responded,—from the library, he was sure,—the voice of a woman.
"What did you say?"
"I am Mr. Van Pycke. Don't be alarmed. It's—it's all a mistake. I—"
"Mr. Van Pycke? Why—why—"
He recognized the voice.
"Is that you, Miss Downing?"
"Are you—are you sure that you are Mr. Van Pycke? I have my finger on the call button. Wha—what are you doing here?"
"I am trying to get out," he said, lowering his voice. "Don't you recognize my voice?"
"Ye—yes, I think I do."
"Where are you?"
"Why didn't you go out before?" asked the voice, a bit querulously he thought.
"I am not a sleep walker," he said. Realizing that it was a poor time to jest, he hastily supplemented: "I went to sleep—waiting. Where are you? What time is it? Is every one in bed?"
The curtains at the opposite end of the room parted very slowly. First, a strong, red glow appeared beyond, mellow and somewhat fitful; then the shadowy figure of the girl was silhouetted against the red, framed on either side by shivering drapery.
She was still wearing the white satin evening gown. He took hope.
"It isn't so late, after all," he cried, starting toward her.
"I hope you will go away at once, Mr. Van Pycke," she said quickly. "It is half-past one—and every one is in bed. I don't understand why you are still here."
"I'll tell you all about it," he said, not very confidently. "Don't turn me out until I've got warm, please. I give you my word, I'm paralyzed with the cold."
"Really, Mr. Van Pycke, I—I can't have you here—I mean, it is so terribly late. I—I—"
"Were you horribly frightened?" he asked, somewhat irrelevantly. He had come up to her by this time, and, peering beyond, saw a splendid fire in the library grate. There were no lights in the room. A big chair stood before the fender, invitingly.
His teeth were chattering.
"I was almost petrified," she said rather breathlessly. "If you had not called out, I—I think my heart would have refused to beat again. Oh, I am so glad it is you and not a burglar!"
"May I come in and get warm?" he pleaded. She saw that he was shivering. With a quick glance over her shoulder she stood aside and allowed him to pass.
"You are cold," she said. "Sit down by the fire. I'll poke it up a bit. Just for a few minutes, and then you must go. I wonder if the racket alarmed the servants. You see, I am the only person in this part of the house, Mr. Van Pycke."
He looked up from the grate, over which he was holding his hands. "By the way, why are you not in bed? I distinctly remember you said good night—and started."
She hesitated. "I wasn't sleepy," she said.
"On the other hand, I slept very soundly," he said. "Have you been down here all this time?"
"Since twelve o'clock. I love a grate fire."
"Won't you sit down? Do."
"No, thank you. I'll wait till you have gone. If I sit down now, you'll stay, I'm afraid."
He moved the big chair and drew up another for himself beside it. She watched the proceedings without approval or resentment. When the two chairs stood side by side before the fender, he motioned for her to sit down. She was now gazing at him fixedly, a somewhat detached smile on her lips. After a moment she shrugged her shoulders and sat down. He promptly dropped into the other chair and stretched out his feet to the fire.
"You said something that surprised me, just as you left me—two hours ago," he remarked, after a long silence. "A year's vacation on full pay," he repeated.
"I am Mrs. De Foe's secretary," she said quietly. He turned to look at her.
