"Most decidedly not! Please don't mention the matter to anybody. You can give me the key of the museum till Miss Kingsley returns. You don't need to go there again at present?"
"I'd be scared to death!" confessed Lorraine.
In spite of Uncle Barton Forrester's injunctions, the episode of the cut telephone wires became known. The Castletons on their return home had found Madame Bertier in their father's studio, sitting for her portrait, and, being full of the exciting subject, had poured out their story. The pretty Russian was aghast.
"It is too horrible!" she exclaimed; "to have happened while Miss Kingsley is away! Some burglar would be bad—but it is perhaps a spy. I was at The Gables yesterday, just for a moment, to fetch a book. I saw nothing! Had I met anyone I should indeed have been very alarmed! The police will no doubt keep the house under observation now."
"The question is how anybody got into the room when it was locked," said Claudia.
"Perhaps they brought a ladder. You say the window was left open?"
"Yes, but it's shut and fastened now. Whoever came wouldn't be able to get in so easily again."
The Easter holidays were nearly over, and in a few days the Miss Kingsleys would be back to look after their own property, and take what precautions they thought fit against burglars or spies. At the near prospect of term time, Claudia, whose spirits had effervesced lately, suddenly waxed serious. Lorraine could not make out what was the matter with her.
"You look about as cheerful as an undertaker, old sport!" she remonstrated. "Something's got on your nerves!"
"I'm in a beastly hole," admitted Claudia, with a gusty sigh. "I know I'm a slacker."