Susan saw that her opportunity had arrived. She conceived the devilish plan of striking another blow at Mary, while she was in the sensitive condition of approaching maternity.

So maddened by her hate was this woman that she even thought of gaining access to her enemy's baby when it was born, and stealing it from her, or, perhaps, killing it; but she dismissed this as too perilous to be practicable; for her malice had not made her altogether reckless of consequences.

She felt that there must be some other method as sure, though free from danger to herself, by which she might attack the mind of Mary with a sudden shock from which she could never recover. But how to carry out this design? To write another letter was out of the question. Susan Riley dared not commit to writing the venom with which she determined to complete her work.

Time passed by and she felt greatly disgusted with herself that she had so far been unable to devise anything. All her ingenuity could not discover a means of satisfying her hate, tempered as it was by cowardice.

One morning she read the announcement of the birth of Mary's child in the papers—"The wife of Dr. H. Duncan of a son." The words seemed to burn themselves into her brain.

So entirely was she the slave of her mania of hate that she now neglected her business and employed the greater portion of each day in watching the home in St. John's Wood.

She did not herself question the doctor's servants, as it might stand in the way of future plans to be recognized by them, but she discovered several shops at which the family dealt, and would go into these under the pretext of buying some small article, and elicit a good deal of information by means of casual inquiries about Mrs. Duncan.

She learnt that Mary was "doing well, but suffering from great weakness."

There was one old woman who kept a newspaper shop. She was very fond of a gossip with a customer, and was also wont to take a deep interest in all her neighbours' affairs, prying assiduously into them whenever possible.

Susan had soon discovered these useful traits in the old woman's character, so often called on her with the object of sounding her.

One day, about a week after the birth of Mary's child, Susan went into the shop and purchased a copy of The Guardian newspaper.

"Good morning, Mrs. Harris," she said, "I have not seen you for some days; I hope you are well."

"As well as can be expected, Miss, in this world of misery and trouble."

"Why, Mrs. Harris, I should not have thought that the world was using you very hardly. But I suppose when one is a sympathetic soul like you, ever thinking over other people's woes, one gets through a good deal of suffering by proxy."

Mrs. Harris hardly understood the meaning of the words, certainly not the sarcastic drift of them, but took them as a complimentary tribute to the tenderness of her heart; so she shook her curls slowly backwards and forwards and looked mournful.

"Ah yes, Miss!" she said, "I really do think that I take as much interest in other peoples' sorrows as in my own."

"As a true Christian should," replied Susan, biting her lips to conceal the smile she could scarcely keep down. "I noticed how feelingly you spoke about that poor lady who had the baby the other day—the doctor's wife—Mrs. Duncan I think her name was. How is she getting on now, by the way, Mrs. Harris—have you heard?"

"Poor thing! Poor thing!" said the old lady in a lackadaisical voice, putting on a very solemn expression and shaking her corkscrew curls again.

"Is she worse then?" asked Susan.

"No, no! It is not that—at least not exactly that. I believe that her confinement has passed by in a very satisfactory way; but—" and she shook her head yet once again in a mysterious fashion.

"I do not quite understand you," observed Susan.

"If I were a gossip, which I am glad to say I am not," spoke up Mrs. Harris in deliberate tones, "I might say strange things about that house."

"Good gracious! what do you mean?"

"Her husband is a popular man hereabouts it is true—but—" and Mrs. Harris shut her mouth with a snap, as if determined to say no more.

"You don't mean to say that her husband ill-treats her!"

"No, Miss! I don't exactly say that, I don't know that he does. All I say is that it is very, very strange, but I'd rather say nothing more about it, Miss."

Susan made no further remark just then, but proceeded to select and purchase a few copies of The Family Herald; she knew that if she waited a little longer, the old lady's gossiping instincts would compel her to tell all her story, even without any questioning.

"Do you think, Miss," Mrs. Harris recommenced at last, "that a lady with everything she can have in the way of comfort around her, could get pale and melancholy and hardly ever speak a word to anyone for weeks, without any reason at all?"

"No, I should think not—that is unless she is becoming mad," replied Susan.

"Now that's exactly it, Miss! Is she becoming mad, or is she ill-treated by her husband—it's one or the other—now which is it?"

"Did you say that they quarrelled?"

"I have spoken with the servants—they come over here to get a paper now and again. They say there never was a kinder husband than the doctor—but they can't tell—it may be all his deceit like. I once read of a husband—he was a doctor too—and his wife began to ail; she got paler and thinner and weaker every day. He pretended to love her so much, and was so concerned about her, and he nursed her himself, and allowed none but himself to prepare her food. Well do you know, Miss, at last she died—and what do you think was discovered afterwards?" At this point of her narrative she put on her spectacles and looked steadfastly at Susan.

"I really cannot imagine—what was it?"

"He had been poisoning her all the time for her money—There!" whispered Mrs. Harris in a melo-dramatic voice.

"Dear me! how shocking! you make my flesh creep. And do you really think that this Dr. Duncan is doing the same?" asked Susan, much amused at the old woman's folly.

"No, no, Miss, don't go away and think I believe that," Mrs. Harris exclaimed in alarm; "all I say is that it's strange—very strange indeed."

"And what do the servants think about it?"

"They think that there's something wrong here," and she tapped her forehead. "The maid says she's got the horrors like. She's very afraid about her baby; she seems to think that there's some harm coming to it; she won't let it out of her sight, and when anyone comes into the room, she starts and trembles fearful. They say, Miss, that it's just as if she had a delusion that everyone wanted to murder the child. Now that ain't natural like, allowing for all a mother's affection."

"It is indeed very strange," said Susan musingly; "but I must not waste your time any longer, Mrs. Harris—I am a sad gossip. Good morning to you, I will see you again soon."

So this was Mary's vulnerable point. Susan had suspected as much. She fancied that it would not be very difficult to make use of this extreme anxiety of the mother for her child.

As she came out of the shop she noticed an old woman, shabbily dressed in black and much bent with age, tottering feebly along the pavement on the opposite side of the street with a large basket on her arm.

Had Susan kept her eyes as open as usual during these expeditions to St. John's Wood, she would have observed, before this, that she herself was not the only person who was acting the detective round Dr. Duncan's house. On nearly every occasion that she had come to the neighbourhood, the shabby old woman had been there too, dogging her footsteps, watching her movements unsuspected, spying the spy.

Susan had contrived to discover that Dr. Duncan was in the habit every Saturday of visiting a patient who lived a considerable way out of London. Failing, as I have said, with all her cleverness, to mature a definite plan of action, she determined to risk all, and call boldly on Mary while her husband was away on the following Saturday.

She had a great confidence in her luck; she felt that something would turn up to favour her purpose, if she once gained admittance into the house. Knowing Mary as she did, she considered that it would not be difficult to terrify her again into her former crazed state.

For a few days prior to her contemplated visit Susan was very fidgety; so to occupy her mind and prevent it from dwelling too anxiously on the perils of her task, she employed herself in a way which was peculiarly congenial and interesting to her. She set to work to forge as well as she was able—and she succeeded very fairly—a variety of documents; some purported to be letters from Catherine King, and other members of the late Secret Society; there were copies too of imaginary warrants for the arrest of unknown persons, whose appearance was carefully described. All these pointed to a great danger which threatened those who had been connected with the Sisterhood, especially Mary Duncan. There were other papers too which tended to show that the members of the Society attributed their peril to the treason of one of their number—clearly Mary—who was accused of having made certain disclosures to the authorities. They were alarming documents, intended to prove clearly that the young mother was suspected by both sides, was being hunted down by both the police and by her old associates.

Susan would laugh to herself as she completed each of these works of art, and would look at them with no small pride. "I wonder if she will be fool enough to swallow all this?" she asked herself. "And yet why not? If she does believe in them, she will see that one course only is left to her—to fly from England, to desert her husband and her child, so as not to bring disgrace upon their heads. I believe I am on the right track at last. Ah! Susie, you have not forgotten your cunning after all!"

At last the fatal Saturday arrived, and she started for St. John's Wood, armed with her papers, intending to show some, all, or none of them, to Mary, exactly as circumstances should make expedient.

She prowled about in the neighbourhood of the house, till she saw the doctor go out. She followed him to the railway station and satisfied herself that he had started; but she did not observe that the shabby old woman with the basket was following her also, though at a long distance, never losing sight of her.

Susan walked back to the doctor's house, reaching it about ten minutes after he had left it, and rang the bell.

The housemaid opened the door.

"How is Mrs. Duncan to-day? I have called to see her," Susan said.

"Mrs. Duncan is very ill, ma'am, and she is not allowed to see anyone."

"Oh! but it is all right," Susan explained, "I am Mrs. Duncan's oldest friend. I have just met the doctor on my way here. He would have come back with me; but he said he had no time to do so, as he was obliged to catch the train to P——"

"Did Dr. Duncan know that you wished to see my mistress, ma'am?"

"Indeed he did. He particularly asked me to see Mary—Mrs. Duncan I mean, he thinks it will do her good. Will you kindly tell your mistress that Mrs. Riley has called to see her, that the doctor has sent me to see her. Kindly tell her also that I have some news of great importance to communicate to her."

The girl hesitated. She had received strict injunctions to admit no visitors to her mistress. But she could scarcely discredit the statement of this lady, who, she reasoned, must certainly have conversed with the doctor on his way, else she could not have known his destination.

But then she remembered that Dr. Duncan had enjoined her not to take any letter or message to his wife under any circumstances whatever, so she replied: "It is very difficult for me, ma'am, to do as you wish. I have received such strict orders from my master not to carry any message from anyone to my mistress. Could you not call to-morrow, ma'am, when my master will be here."

"You stupid girl!" exclaimed Susan angrily, "do you not understand me? I tell you I have just seen your master; he knows that I am going to call on your mistress. Do you disbelieve my word?"

"No, ma'am, but—"

"But! But what?"

"I don't exactly know, ma'am, but—" the girl stammered, looking very confused and red, then suddenly her face brightened, and she exclaimed, "Ah! here is the nurse, ma'am; I will ask her about it."

For at that moment a comely-looking strong country girl came out of a door leading into the hall, carrying a little white bundle in her arms.

"Ah!" cried Susan, "is that dear Mrs. Duncan's little boy? Do let me see it!"

There could be no harm in allowing the strange lady to see the baby for a moment, at any rate, so the proud nurse drew back the clothes and disclosed a little sleeping face.

Susan felt her veins tingle with an excitement, the meaning of which she could not herself understand, as she approached and looked at the innocent features.

"Mary's child," she said, "Mary's child; dear me, how strange!" and she stooped to kiss him, as she knew it was her bounden duty to do, if she did not wish to offend the nurse beyond pardon, and so prejudice her chance of seeing the mother.

But just as her lips were about to touch the soft cheek, a sudden surprised cry from the housemaid made her raise her head again.

Then her cowardly spirit failed her, and she looked aghast at what was before her, motionless, save for the tremor that shook her frame.

A form more like a ghost than a living woman was hurrying down the stairs towards her, with arms outstretched, a form that seemed to glide rather than run, so evidently unconscious was its motion.

Clad merely in her white bed-clothes, with face as white as they, the mother was rushing to save her babe. Her expression was one of fixed intense horror; her lips were apart, her eyes dilated, but she spoke no word. She flew to the nurse and snatched her infant into her arms, pressing it against her breast, palpitating with her frightful emotion.

She stood erect and firm, but trembling in every limb, staring at Susan with the same fixed look. Her white throat rose and fell convulsively with the choking sensations that prevented her from speaking.

She stood thus an awful image for many minutes, the frightened servants gazing at her open-mouthed, not knowing what to do. At last she spoke; she raised her arm, and pointing at Susan, cried in a voice that did not sound like her own, so strange and hollow it was, "Go! Go!"

Susan hesitated, and seemed to be about to speak, when the mother made a step towards her, with so menacing a gesture, with such fury in her eyes—altogether so different a being from the timid girl of old—that Susan was quite cowed, and lost her presence of mind. She shrank back and tried to smile, but she could not manage it; the grin as of a wild beast at bay, full of rage and mortal fear, was the only result.

"Go!" cried the mother again.

Susan felt that she was beaten, she could do no more, she looked round at the group, and then without a word slunk out of the door, which the housemaid, recovering her presence of mind, slammed indignantly behind her.

Mary hurried upstairs with the baby, saying nothing, and went into her bed-room, the two women following, full of simple sympathy, yet knowing not how to show it.

Then to their astonishment the poor mother, with frantic haste, yet with tender care, pulled the clothes off her child, and laid him on the bed. With an eager anxiety that was painful to see, she examined all the little body, dreading lest she should find the small spot which showed that the accursed instrument of the Sisterhood had done its work.

But there was nothing to be seen. "Oh, my God! I thank Thee, I thank Thee. Oh, my God! My Christ," she cried, incoherently, as she fell weeping on the child, covering it with passionate kisses. Then she rose and said wildly, "Jane! Jane! please look and see that there is no mark—no wound—nothing. I cannot see, my eyes are so dim. Please look carefully, and make quite, quite certain of it."

The nurse, thinking to humour her poor crazed mistress, pretended to examine the baby, though her own eyes were really as dim with tears as were the mother's. "No, ma'am, I assure you that there is nothing at all—nothing. The little darling is all right; but now you must go to bed, poor dear; you will be very ill if you don't. For your little baby's sake go to bed, and try and rest."

Mary, now as docile as a child, allowed herself to be put into her bed, and sobbed herself asleep—a broken slumber full of frightful dreams, from which she awoke into as painful a delirium.