"What might I have heard, Dick?" she asked, approaching close to his side. He passed his arms around her.
"Something that would have reminded you----" He broke off abruptly with, "No matter."
"But tell me, Dick."
"When I was at the Royal George I fancied I heard a man playing on a tin whistle."
Mrs. Chester's lips quivered, and a shudder ran through her frame.
"The new tenant," pursued Mr. Chester, "hang him! he's got into my head like a black fog!--the new tenant had just gone away, and good riddance to him, when I heard the music, as I thought, and I went to the door to look. I saw nobody, and a man in the Royal George said that our new lodger had something in his pocket that looked like a whistle or a flute. As he came straight home, I thought you might have heard him play it."
"I was asleep, Dick, when he came home; the slamming of the street door woke me." She paused and played nervously with a button of her husband's coat. "Dick, I dreamt of our Ned to-night."
"Ay, Loo," he answered softly.
"What can have become of him? Where is he now, the dear lad?"
"Best for us not to know, perhaps," replied Mr. Chester gloomily.