A ROIANCE RO/

end of the room opencd, and Bertha lawney entered Tike a shadow, and we stood face to face. She seemed to me to have crown two or three years older, and she wore a look of mecffable mental suffering.

“You wish to see me?” she murmured, faintly.

“1 do, madam,” T answered, her a into which she mechanical figure. 1 am

as 1 offered sank hke o sorry to disturh

vou at this hour: sorry, too, to mtrude upon vour sorrow, for you have a sorrow, and skeleton haunts

vou.”’

“What do you mean?’ she asked, as she shuddcered., sighed, and looked nervously around the room.

“I must ask vou another question by way

A DITECTIVEES CASLE-BOOA. 407 Tre- which clicited no response, T withdrew:; but 1

was conscious that T took forth from that chamber of shadows a link that would prove an important one in the cham I was patiently trying to piece together. The circumstances of the hour nceessarily made me thoughtful, and almost unconsciously I found mysclf coing down the leaf-strewn path beneath the avenue of trees that led to the lodge-gate, when suddenly T was aroused by the sound of somconce approaching.

[ mmmediately stepped off the path and amongst the trees, where 1 stood concealed. The approaching person proved to be Mro Tre- lawney.

[ followed with the mtention of accosting him, but cre he had gone very far his

of answer to vours,” T said. “Ind vou know David Brinsley?”

“1 have seen lum,” she replied, after some moments of hesi- tancy.

“ Do vou be- lieve him to be dead?” "T'he question startled her.

sShe rosce to her feet suddenly . her eyes flashed, and her pale checks flushed httle. Pointing at me, and look- ing altogether as il she was some Imperious ruler uttumg a stern decree, she sad, hoarsely

“Go!oquit the house. Tl answeér no more questions.”

Bearing in mind that it 15 best to leave an angry woman, like a sleeping dog. alonce and as Miss Bertha Trelawney had so far played into my hands that T felt further questioning then would be supercrogation, I bowed as gracefully as T could, and sadd

“Lumml\ maddm, I will comply with your request,” and bidding her good-night,

TUUSHIL SATD,

HOANRSELY, "GO

sister met ham. SPhe had ovi- dently been on the watch., She was without bonnet, but had wrapped a shawl around her head.

She scized his arm cagerly, and | heard her Say, m a tone preg-

nant with anxicty

zmd grief - ()h Samucl !

[ am so gltlcl VOu

have come. That dreadful man Donovan has

been here, and 1t scems to me as if he had tugged at my very heart- strings and rifled my brain. I must not -—dare not sce him again, for he makes me weak and powerless, when I should be strong and defiant.”

“What do you mean??” demanded her brother, hotly.

What answer she made to this T know not, for they had passed beyond the radius of my hearing, Yet something-—instinet or pre- call 1t what you will- ])r()mpted me

lm(fc about the house, as if in a vague aml undefined way I expected thg trees or