"Then why——"
Again there came the questioning and again her words outran the answer. "I'll tell you in the morning—in the sunlight, please."
"You know?" She nodded. "In the morning, then. Good-night."
He lighted her to her bedroom door but when she had shut it and heard him go down the stairs she wished the house were not quite so still, and with the wish she heard a low, shuddering moan, and then another. That was Clara Rutherford crying for her dead.
She undressed with fumbling, nervous fingers, and, stealing into bed, she covered her ears to shut out the dreadful quiet punctuated by that sound, yet she sat up again, compelled to listen while, with a regular insistence, the moaning invaded the night. A little later there came a stealthy, bumping sound along the passage, and she was ready to leap out and bolt her door, when Alexander's voice came low and clear.
"It's me, Theresa. I'm sleeping just outside your door."
"Oh, is it you?" she cried.
"You won't be lonely now?"
"Oh no, I won't be lonely."
"You must go to sleep."