Mrs. Jenkins let the subject drop. She had so nearly erred from her strict fidelity to Eph's directions, that the sooner she put herself out of reach of a similar danger the safer she felt. 'Well, it don't matter,' she said. 'It will be many a long day before Mrs. Griswold will have any thought of such things again. She kept up wonderfully yesterday, when you and Mr. Carey were here, and even till after the doctor had seen her, but she must have suffered horribly when she shut herself up in her own room, for when it got quite dark, and she hadn't rung her bell, or made no sign, Justine and I got frightened, and we consulted as to what we had better do about going into the room without she had rung her bell; but, at last, I made up my mind I could not bear it any longer, and I took the baby and went in. She was lying all her length on the hearth-rug, with her face hidden in her hair and her hands; not insensible, she was in a kind of stupid despair. She let us lift her up like a log, and she never spoke one word, not even when I brought the baby to her. She just took her little hand up listlessly in hers for a minute, and let it drop.'

In the fulness of her heart, Mrs. Jenkins's homely manner gained a certain dignity of refinement, which acted immediately upon the sensitive nerves of her sister, whose tears fell silently, and who saw with her mental vision the scene her sister's words represented.

'And then we got her into bed, and sent for the doctor. He gave her a sleeping draught, and said she was to be watched. Justine wanted to sit up with her, but I would not let her--she is young, and young people are never wakeful--so I stayed and sat until this morning, just outside the curtain, peeping at her through a little chink where it joined the tester; and through the chink I could see her eyes wide open, quite unchanged all through the hours of night. I suppose it was the medicine that kept her so still, for she neither sighed, moaned, spoke, nor stirred. She might have been a dead woman, with only the eyes alive, until after the sun rose, and then she began to shiver. I put an eider-down over her, and in a few minutes she dropped asleep. I suppose it was the medicine had its own way at last, and there she is now.'

'The longer she sleeps the better; she has nothing but trouble to wake to,' said Miss Montressor. 'My goodness! I wonder why it is so--what harm did this creature ever do?'

'Ah,' said Mrs. Jenkins, 'and what harm did Mr. Griswold ever do, or anything but good, so far as I can find out? They say here he hasn't an enemy in the world.'

'O, that's all nonsense, my dear!' said Miss Montressor. 'No man ever was so rich, so prosperous, and so happy as Mr. Griswold without having lots of enemies; the only wonderful thing is, that he could have any enemies so much in earnest about it as to run the risk of killing him. I suppose they will find out who did it?'

'Suppose they will find out!' said Mrs. Jenkins. 'Of course they will find out--what's the police for?'

'A good many people have been asking that same question lately,' said Miss Montressor, with a smile at her sister's simplicity. 'That is not, by a long way, the worst murder that they have not found out. You manage things better over here, I daresay, but in England, for some time past, the police have been making themselves famous either by catching no one at all in cases of crime, or by catching the wrong man.'

'They say it was not robbery,' said Mrs. Jenkins, 'but that he was taken for somebody else.'

'That's all hearsay, my dear,' replied Miss Montressor, with an air of superior wisdom. 'Don't talk about it to the other servants, but I may tell you in confidence that Bryan Duval, who is about the best detective going, has very little doubt that the motive, if not the murderer, is to be found on this side the Atlantic.'