“Miss Pembury! My dear Miss Pembury, don’t take this so much to heart. I’ve no doubt the keys will turn up. But even if they should not, pray, pray understand that you are in no way to blame.”
“Oh yes, I am, oh yes, I am. I ought to have taken them with me!”
“Not at all. I often leave my own keys in the pocket of my coat, and there was not the least reason for you to think yours were any less safe. And remember, we don’t yet know whether it was your keys that were used. A lock may be picked, you know.”
But, though Rhoda thanked him and tried to hope, she was weighed down by the dreadful certainty that it was indeed her keys which had been used by the thief. And there flashed through her mind as she ran up the stairs a horrible vague dread that this theft might have been committed with the object of discrediting her with Sir Robert.
She flew along the corridor, locked herself in her room, and opening the door of her wardrobe, pulled out the dress with trembling hands, and felt in the pockets.
The keys were not there.
With a low cry, she put the dress back, and looked about the room in the vain hope that she might have dropped the keys somewhere while she was putting her dress away.
But it was hoping against hope, and at last she had to give up her search, and stealing out of her room, feeling as guilty as if she herself had been the thief, she went slowly back along the corridor and down the stairs, to the study.
“Come in,” cried Sir Robert in his kind voice.
She could scarcely turn the handle of the door, and when she was inside the room, she could do nothing but utter whispered exclamations of distress.