"Very likely, but they do not walk together. Sometimes it's one, and sometimes it's the other. I know their different steps, and I never hear them both at the same time."
Frank felt a cold shiver thrill his blood.
"I have been in the house," she resumed, after a minute's pause, "for five years; ever since Mrs. Cavanagh died, and I cannot tell you what its secret is. But it has one, I am certain, and I often go about the halls and into the different rooms and ask low to myself, 'Was it here that it happened, or was it there?' There is a little staircase on the second floor which takes a quick turn towards a big empty room where nobody ever sleeps, and though I have no reason for shuddering at that place, I always do, perhaps because it is in that big room the young ladies walk so much. Can you understand my feeling this way, and I no more than a servant to them?"
A month ago he would have uttered a loud disclaimer, but he had changed much in some regards, so he answered: "Yes, if you really care for them."
The look she gave him proved that she did, beyond all doubt.
"If I did not care for them do you think I would stay in such a gloomy house? I love them both better than anything else in the whole world, and I would not leave them, not for all the money any one could offer me."
She was evidently sincere, and Frank felt a vague relief.
"I am glad," said he, "that they have so good a friend in their own house; as for your fears you will have to bear them, for I doubt if the young ladies will ever take any one into their confidence."
"Not—not their lawyer?"
"No," said he, "not even their lawyer."