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“I hope you’ll come again,” he said. “She needs friends. She needs some nice women to talk to. She doesn’t talk much any more.”

He left me at my gate and for a moment I had a strange feeling that there was a light in the hospital suite. It went out just then, if it had ever been there at all. But, in view of that, it was disconcerting on my return to find William waiting for me with a long face.

“Sorry to tell you, miss. The bells are ringing again.”

“Good heavens,” I said peevishly, “that man today said the wiring was all right.”

“That may be,” he said somberly. “Perhaps it has nothing to do with the wiring.”

Nevertheless, just to be certain, before I went to bed I went up the stairs to look around. The door was still locked, and soon after I was asleep.

I wakened late the next morning to a bright sun and Maggie with my breakfast tray and an expression which should have soured the cream for my coffee.

“When you’re up and dressed,” she said, “I’ll trouble you to look at something.”

“What is it? And where?”

“In the hospital suite,” she said, and proceeded methodically to get out my clothing for the day. I looked at her stiff figure with exasperation.

“Why on earth are you so mysterious?” I said peevishly. “What’s wrong with the hospital suite?”

“When you’re up and dressed I’ll show you,” she said in a low voice, and lapsed into a dour silence.

“Where is Mrs. Ransom? Is she awake?” I inquired finally.

“She’s up. She took the car and went to the village for a wave. That Jordan went with her.”

“Then why on earth do you have to whisper?”

She made no reply, and as soon as I was dressed I found myself going once more up the steep stairs, I ahead and Maggie following. The outer door was locked as usual, but that was all that was as usual. I opened the door onto chaos. In the anteroom the trunks had been opened and their contents strewn over the floor. Even the mattress on the cot had been taken off, and every box and chest had been searched.

Maggie had followed me in and waited until I caught my breath.

“You were still asleep when Mike wanted one of the screens for a cellar window this morning,” she said, “so I got the key and brought him up here. That’s what we found. And when I went into the other room,
that
was there.”

She led me to the door into the quarantine room proper. At first it looked to me much as I had left it. Then I saw where she was pointing. There was a hatchet lying on one of the beds. It looked quite ordinary as it lay there, but I could not repress a shudder. It was sharp and dangerous.

“Are you certain Mike didn’t bring it up?”

“He never put foot in this room.”

“Does it belong in the house?”

“No, miss. I’ve asked downstairs. The old hatchet’s in the woodshed, where it belongs.”

Save that one of the beds had been slightly moved, the room itself was as I had seen it last. The window was closed, and if anyone had entered by Arthur’s old method, via trellis and roof, there was no sign of it.

I saw in Maggie’s face a reflection of my own suspicions.

“If you’re asking me,” she said, “it’s that Jordan. She’s always snooping around. Only—what did she want, miss?”

I surveyed the two rooms helplessly.

“I haven’t any idea, Maggie,” I said. “And don’t tell the other people in the house. I have trouble enough already.”

Everybody was too busy to straighten the place that day, but I did two things before I went downstairs again. I sent Maggie for some nails, and using the blunt edge of the hatchet fastened the window so it could not be opened; and I stood by while William and Mike, the gardener, together put a padlock on the outer door.

I was downstairs in my room hiding the key in my bureau drawer when I remembered that I had left the hatchet where it was, on the bed; although Maggie wanted to go back for it I left it there. It did not seem important at the time.

I
T WAS THE NEXT DAY THAT
Juliette disappeared.

I did not like her, but I am glad to feel that at least a part of that last evening of hers was a cheerful one. She had dressed rather elaborately for dinner, and I remembered that she had a number of cocktails before we went in to eat. Apparently the wave had improved her morale, and if she knew anything about the condition of those upper rooms she gave no sign of it.

I, too, was feeling more normal. I had played eighteen holes of golf that afternoon, and I was content to sit still and give her the admiration she always craved.

“That’s a lovely dress,” I told her. And I can still see her turning around, complacently, in front of the long Chippendale mirror in the drawing room.

“It
is
pretty good,” she said. “And I’ve lost an inch off my waist.”

Standing there, tall and slim and smiling, her hair freshly waved, and inspecting herself. Eying her complexion closely in the strong sunset light, and giving a nod of approval. And all the time, as the clock on the mantel ticked on, her span of life growing shorter. The sands in the glass running out.

I am even glad that Lizzie gave her an unusually good dinner that night; and that I said nothing when, later on, she sent Jordan for a long cape with a high fur collar, and stated that she was taking the car.

“I’m fed up with sitting around here alone,” she said. “Doesn’t anybody ever come in? I thought you were the belle of the place!”

She saw my face and laughed her mocking little laugh.

“So I’m the trouble,” she said. “Little Marcia’s trouble, eh? Well, you know the answer to that.”

She went out, and soon after I heard the car. Weeks later we were to wonder about that drive of hers. Where had she gone? Whom had she seen? Had it led to the catastrophe of the next day, and if so, how? But when we did know it was too late to matter.

Tony Rutherford came in just after she had gone.

“Hid in the bushes until she was out of the way,” he said, grinning. “Heard she was here. What’s the idea, anyhow? And how are you? Bearing up?”

“Pretty well,” I told him. “Ring for a drink if you want one, Tony.”

He rang and then coming back, eyed me closely.

“Not so good,” was his verdict. “Juliette
and
ghosts. Either one would set me running like blazes.”

“Not always,” I reminded him.

He smiled sheepishly.

“Forget that, won’t you? I was an idiot, of course. Maybe I just lost my sense of humor. And she was a lovely thing,” he added reminiscently. “God, what a lovely thing she was!”

I was astonished to find how little that meant to me now. There had been a time when, troubled as I was, I would have wanted to put my head on his shoulder and hear him offer his usual comfort.

“Liquor for men and tears for women,” he would say. “What would we do without them?”

That night I felt nothing at all. He was as good-looking as ever, as immaculate in his dinner clothes, but I could survey him with complete detachment. He got his highball and settled himself comfortably in a chair by the fire.

“Now tell Papa all about it,” he said. “What does she want? Don’t tell me she came for love.”

“She wants a lump sum instead of alimony,” I blurted out. “We can’t raise it, of course.”

“How much?”

“A hundred thousand.”

He whistled. “That’s a lot of money. What does she want it for? Want to marry again?”

“If she does she’s very queer about it. She says she wants to leave America. She seems frightened, Tony.”

“It would take a lot to scare her,” he observed with a grin. “Better get rid of her, Marcia. She’s little poison ivy, my dear. Always has been and always will be.”

She came in soon after that. I thought she looked upset, but when she saw Tony she smiled.

“Why, Tony darling!” she said. “After all these years!”

“Only six months, to look at you,” he said, grinning. “How do you do it, Juliette?”

She gave him a long look.

“The virtuous life, Tony,” she said. “Early to bed and early to rise. You’ve heard of it, haven’t you?”

“Sure,” he said. “It gets worms, or something. And who is your particular worm of the moment?”

I listened as long as I could. She got him over onto the davenport beside her, and he looked both gratified and uneasy. But after a while I whistled for Chu-Chu and went out into the grounds. In the servants’ hall I could see the household staff still at the table, but it looked like a sober meal, with Jordan at William’s right, holding her coffee-cup with her little finger elegantly extended and looking like a skeleton at the feast. Then Chu-Chu, set up a sharp staccato barking, and when I called to her a man stepped out of the shrubbery.

It was Arthur.

There was no moon, and I did not know him until he spoke to me.

“That you, Marcia?”

“Arthur! What on earth—”

“I don’t want to be seen,” he said. “I flew up this afternoon. Mary Lou thinks I’m out on the sloop. Where can we talk?”

I told him that Tony and Juliette were inside, and suggested the bench down by the pond. When we reached it he lit a cigarette, and I saw how haggard he looked. He had not told Mary Lou he was coming, he said. She hated Juliette, but he had to see her and to see me too.

“I can’t carry on, Marcia,” he said, “and this last thing has only forced my hand. I’m in debt up to the neck, and with taxes and everything I’m about through.”

What he was going to do, he said, was to ask Juliette to take less alimony. If she refused he would go into court and seek relief.

“She’ll raise the roof, of course,” he said. “But I have to do something. I owe everybody, even the dentist! And what with the office expenses—” His voice trailed off, and I reached over and took his hand.

“I might help again,” I said. “I hate to turn off the servants. They’ve been here so long, and what would they do? But I still have Mother’s pearls. We’d better get rid of her if we can. Not only now. For the future. I’ve stood about all I can. When I think what she’s done to us I’m not normal.”

He laughed a little, but his voice was hard.

“You’re not going to sell Mother’s pearls,” he said. “I’ve stripped you of everything else.”

At that moment we heard Tony’s voice from somewhere above.

“Hey, Marcia,” he called. “What are you doing? Hunting pneumonia?”

“I’m coming,” I said, and got up.

“It’s useless to see her,” I told Arthur in a low voice, “but I’ll come back for you after Tony’s gone.”

“Don’t let the servants know I’m here.”

“No.”

I found Tony waiting reproachfully for me at the door.

“I’ve had an hour’s vamping, and liked it,” he said, running his arm through mine. “But enough’s enough. Come in and save my reputation, won’t you?”

I thought there was a change in the tempo of the library when I went back to it. Juliette looked relaxed and comfortable, but Tony was silent, for him. The badinage had gone, and when Juliette asked him to ride with her early the next morning he pleaded a golf engagement and begged off. She raised her eyebrows and gave him an odd look.

“As you like,” she said, with a cool little smile.

There was not much more. I remember Tony retailing a bit of local gossip; and also that it had started to rain, and that I hoped Arthur would remember where we kept the key to the garage and go there for shelter. But finally Juliette began to yawn. Tony alone was one thing. Tony with me sitting by was another. She got up at last and Tony took the hint.

“Suffering cats,” he said. “It’s eleven o’clock. How long are you to be here, Juliette?”

“I’m staying until some business is arranged,” she said sweetly. “I can’t go until it’s finished.”

I went with him into the hall, and I thought he wanted to speak to me. But the door into the library was open, and after glancing at it he bade me a perfunctory good-bye and drove off at his usual wild speed. The rain was stopping by that time and a cold fog was coming in, but I did not dare to bring Arthur into the house at once, although the service wing was dark. I would have to wait until Jordan had put Juliette to bed, with all that that implied, from cream on her face to baby pillows and an electric heating pad. Also she had a wretched habit of slipping down to the library at the last minute for a book for Juliette. I knew I would have to wait until they had both settled down for the night.

I left a lamp on and went upstairs, and it was almost an hour before the sounds ceased from the room down the hall. Then I heard a muffled good night from Jordan and the soft closing of her door. It was half past twelve when, having located Arthur and put him to dry by the library fire, I went upstairs again. I thought I heard a bell ringing in the distance, but I had no time to investigate. I opened Juliette’s door and went unceremoniously into her room.

She was reading, propped up against her pillows, and with a chin strap around the lower part of her face. She was evidently annoyed, and she looked at me resentfully.

“You might at least knock, Marcia.”

“I didn’t want to rouse anybody. Arthur’s downstairs, Juliette.”

“Arthur! What does he want?”

“I suppose he’ll tell you himself.”

She got out of bed and whipped off the strap, as well as the net pinned to her hair to save the wave. Her face was not pretty at that moment. It was hard and calculating without its makeup, but there was relief and hope in it too. God knows I do not want to be too hard on her. She had wrecked us all, but I know now how uneasy she was. If she had only gone away, disappeared, she could have saved herself. The trouble was that she could not see herself without money, and it seems never to have occurred to her that she could earn it.

I waited as patiently as I could while she made up her face again: powder, rouge and lipstick. While she got out an elaborate negligee, which she slipped on over her nightgown. Then she stepped into a pair of feathered mules, and I can still remember the click they made as we went down the stairs.

Arthur was in front of the fire, and he had found the whisky and mixed himself a highball. He merely looked at her as she came in.

“Well?” she said. “Why all the secrecy?”