"Are there more horrors to come, dearest?"
"No, for the time being the horrors are all over. That old man came to himself again, and swears that he has been robbed. He made an awful scene. He woke Mamie up, and I had to get her mother to come and see her. I believe Balmayne was nearly making an end of his victim when you knocked. And, oh, my dear boy, I shall be so glad to get away from this awful house."
"You shall leave it tomorrow, never to return," Bruce declared.
"No; not yet. The secret of the shadow that lies over you is bound up in this house. Till it has passed away I stay here. But it is dreadful. The silence of it frightens me. How still it all is now!"
It was very silent then. To the casual eye here was everything that the heart could desire. It seemed hard to associate vulgar crime with all this artistic beauty, with the pictures and statues and flowers.
Suddenly the silence was broken by a laugh. It was the croaking kind of laugh that could only have proceeded from the lips of an old man. But there was pleasure in it. It came strangely after the note of tragedy that had dominated the evening. A door opened somewhere, and the laugh came once more.
Then there was the voice of Balmayne in a key of mirth. The front door was opened, the call of a cab whistle thrilled down the street. It was almost as if there were two sets of people in the house, one family given over to the dark and gloomy, the other all comedy and smiles.
On the impulse of the moment Bruce opened the library door and looked out. It was hard after what Hetty had told him to believe the evidence of his senses.
There was the man who twice within the last hour had been in danger of his life chatting quietly with the man who had robbed him. The two were evidently on the best of terms, for Maitrank was laughing heartily, and Balmayne stood opposite smoking a cigarette like a host who speeds a parting guest.
Outside was the clatter of hoofs and the jingle of harness. The hall door stood open; Balmayne politely helped Maitrank on with his heavy coat. Hetty, standing in the background, began to wonder if she was dreaming.