It is the onlooker who sees most of the game and Aunt Amy was an ideal onlooker. Always self-effacing and silent, she was now more silent and self-effacing still. Consequently the principal actors tended to forget their parts when in her presence. No one explained anything to Aunt Amy but no one concealed anything from her. She simply "didn't matter." So far as the playing out of the little drama was concerned, Aunt Amy was supposed to be safely off the stage. She looked and listened, had her strange flashes of psychic insight and came to her own conclusions about it all, quite undisturbed by facts as they appeared to others. Her conclusions were very simple. Esther loved the doctor. The doctor loved Esther. That, in spite of this, Callandar was deliberately planning to marry Mary she considered a purely arbitrary matter arranged by those mysteriously malignant powers known as "They." Callandar, himself, had clearly no choice, Esther was helpless, and Mary triumphed easily and inevitably because Mary was one of "Them" herself. Aunt Amy had become firmly convinced of this latter fact. Everything went to prove it—the theft of the ring, the threat to shut her (Amy) up, the easy triumph over Esther, and a thousand and one trifles all "confirmation strong as proofs of holy writ." Of course it would be impossible to make this clear to Esther or the doctor. Amy realised that and did not try. But in her own mind she thought of it continually. And her little pile of proof mounted higher day by day.

Esther, absorbed in the care of her step-mother, was not even aware that Aunt Amy noticed her growing listlessness, her heavy eyes, her fits of brooding. She did not know that a silent foot paused before her closed door, listening. All she knew was that it was relief unspeakable to be with Aunt Amy, to let drop the mask of cheerful energy without fear of questioning or of wonder. Aunt Amy didn't matter.

Mary, too, felt that it was needless to hoodwink Amy. No need to pretend with her. She might show herself as irritable, as conscienceless, as nerve-racked and disagreeable as she chose without fear of displaying "symptoms." Aunt Amy was not looking for symptoms, indeed Mary thought she grew more stupid daily. After her marriage something would really have to be done about Amy. She hoped the doctor wouldn't be silly about it.

Even Dr. Callandar was not careful to hide his burden from those faded eyes. He was more self-conscious even with Ann or Bubble than he was with her. What matter if she did see his mouth harden or his eyes burn?—Poor Aunt Amy, such things could have no meaning for her. She was a soul apart.

A soul apart indeed, how far apart none of them quite realised; yet near enough to love—and hate. As the days went by and Esther drooped like a graceful plant athirst for water there grew in Aunt Amy's twisted brain a slow corroding anger. The timid, bitter anger of a weak nature which is often more deadly than the lordly passion of the strong.

If she could only do something. If she could only outwit "Them"! She would do anything at all, if she could only find the thing to do. It was terrible to be so helpless. It was maddening to have to be so careful. Yet careful she must be, she never forgot that. Often as she went about the house or stood in the sunny kitchen rolling out her flaky pie-crust, she pondered over ways and means. But none seemed suitable. Some of her plans were fantastic to a degree, but she always had sense enough to reject them in the end. In her planning she was conscious of no sense of right or wrong but only of suitability. There could be no question of right or wrong in dealing with "Them." They were outside the pale. No. What she wanted was something simple and effective. A little poison, now—in a pie? But Amy knew nothing of poison, nor how to obtain any, nor how to use it effectively in a pie when once obtained. She might consult the doctor perhaps? But something warned Aunt Amy that the doctor would not take kindly to the idea of a little poison in a pie. So this beautiful scheme had to be given up. She sighed.

"What a big sigh, Auntie!" Esther, who was sitting at the table peeling apples, looked up questioningly. "A penny for your thoughts."

A look of cunning came over Aunt Amy's face. And instead of speaking her real thoughts she said, "I was thinking of weddings, Esther."

"But why the sigh?"

"I don't like weddings. Once there was a young girl going to be married. She was very happy. She was so happy that she was afraid to look at her own face in the glass. And it was eleven o'clock on Tuesday. I mean she was waiting for eleven o'clock on Tuesday. She was to be married then. But just one minute before the time, something happened—the clock stopped, I think. Anyway eleven o'clock on Tuesday never came. So she could not get married. And she grew old and her flowers fell to pieces. It was very sad."

"Poor Auntie!"

Aunt Amy moved uneasily. "Do you know who the girl was, Esther?"

"Don't you know, Auntie?"

"No, that is, I am never sure. Sometimes I think I used to know her. But she's gone. I never see her now. I'd like to find her if I could."

"You will find her some day, Auntie. Try not to fret about it."

It was seldom indeed that Aunt Amy spoke even thus vaguely of that other self of hers which she had lost in the tragedy of her youth. Esther's heart was full of pity as she listened. What was her own trouble compared to this? She at least would have her memories.

"There is just one chance," went on Aunt Amy, now gently excited. She had never spoken of this chance before but she felt that Esther might like to hear of it. "Just one chance! You see, the world being round—the world is round, isn't it, Esther?"

"Yes."

"Well, the world being round there is a chance that, if she waits long enough, eleven o'clock on Tuesday may come around again. Then if she is ready and if she has the ring he gave her, the red ring, and if they are both very quick they may be married after all."

"Oh, Aunt Amy, dear! That is why you love the ruby ring?"

But the old lady's memory was clouding again. She looked bewildered and would say no more. Esther kissed her with new tenderness. "I am so glad you have it safely back," she whispered. "You need never be afraid of losing it again."

Aunt Amy found it hard to make the pies that morning. She was enveloped in a deep sadness, a sadness which in some misunderstood way seemed inseparable from the idea of that lost friend of hers, the girl-bride whose marriage hour had never struck. It seemed to Aunt Amy that the girl had been waiting a very long time and was tired. Even if the world were round, it was a very big world and eleven o'clock on Tuesday took a wearisome time to travel around it. She could not understand why she should feel so terribly sorry for the waiting girl, but she did. A hot tear fell into the pie-crust. That would never do! The pie-maker furtively dried her eyes and came back to the consideration of more immediate problems.

It may seem strange that no one noticed the morbid state of Aunt Amy at this time. But it would have been more strange if any one had noticed it. Of outward signs there were practically none. Even the silent hand-wringing had ceased. She ceased to rebuke Jane for stepping upon the third stair; she ceased to talk of the peculiarities inherent in sprigged china. She was more and more careful not to mention "Them," and, as always, her housekeeping was a wonder and a delight.

She even offered to make Mary's wedding-cake. An offer which Mary received graciously. No one could make fruit cake like Aunt Amy and if it proved too big for the house oven the baker could bake it in his. Jane was delighted. She told Bubble that it was to be a "hugeous" cake, the like of which was never seen in Coombe and she defied Ann to produce any relative or ancestor whatever whose wedding-cake had even faintly approached such dimensions. Ann retorted that big wedding-cakes were vulgar and that her Aunt Sykes did not think it proper for a widow woman to have a wedding-cake at all.

The making of the cake was a great mental help to Aunt Amy. It seemed to ease her mind and aid her to think clearly. She thought of many things as she prepared the materials, made most clever plans. That all the plans had to do with the preventing of the marriage and the final circumventing of "Them" goes without saying. There was one especially good plan which came to her while she stoned the raisins. Still another, while the currants were being looked over, and a third, more brilliant than either, while she chopped the candied peel. The trouble was that when she came to mix all her ingredients into the batter, her plans began to mix up too, until all was hopeless confusion. It was most disheartening! And the wedding, now, only a few days off. She wanted to go away into a corner and wring her hands, but if she did, some one might notice—and then "They" would have the chance they were looking for. Aunt Amy was too clever for that!