Here the page was blurred and the letter ended abruptly.
Sealing and directing both she placed them on the mantel in plain sight.
The car line runs past Dupont Circle and the house on Massachusetts Avenue was not far off. She would be in time for the "owl car," which would take her to the B. and O. station. She would not risk calling a carriage.
When she finished the letters Margaret took up her bag and went softly down the great stairway. A dim light was burning in the hall, and by it she made her way to the door, unlocking it and drawing back the heavy bolts. There was no sign of tremor in her hand, no fear in her face,—only a fierce eagerness to be gone. Putting the bag on the outside, and leaving the door ajar that there might be no delay, she crept noiselessly up the stairs again.
The old woman on the other side of the door slept heavily, recking little of the train of consequences her story had started. She might not have withheld it had she known. The striking of the clock admonished Margaret that she had no time to lose. She caught up the baby, bonneted and cloaked against the cold, hushed it with soft whisperings, and stole down the stairs. She did not stop to look around—perhaps she did not dare—she had come to the house a bride; she was leaving it a fugitive. The door creaked as it swung back on its massive hinges. The sound startled her. Outside the street was silent and empty. The city was sleeping its beauty sleep. She closed the door softly, pressed her baby close to her breast, and slipped out into the darkness.
CHAPTER XVI
IN THE "NORTH COUNTREE"
Richard de Jarnette was sitting down to a late breakfast the next morning when his telephone bell rang. He answered it impatiently, as was natural. But what he heard there caused him to leave his hot waffles untouched and go hurrying over to the house on Massachusetts Avenue.
At Margaret's door he met Judge Kirtley, brought thither by a similar message, and together they entered the house. It was evident to Mr. De Jarnette that Judge Kirtley's surprise was as unfeigned as his own.
The servants were gathered in the lower hall in a state of great excitement, with nobody in command. Johnson, the man servant, related how he had found the front door unlocked and fearing burglary had gone straight to Mrs. De Jarnette's room and knocked and knocked without rousing anybody. Then Mammy Cely took up the tale, telling of how she had heard Johnson's knock and made sure she had overslept, etc.—of how she had gone into Miss Margaret's room and found it in confusion, and nobody there. There were two letters that—