I sat down with the rolling-pin in my hand. He made me feel uneasy. Though what he said was beyond me altogether. And as he stood in front of the grate he kept saying things which made me uneasier still.

'Mrs. Merrett, I'm not a romantic character. I'm without feeling; dead to emotion. It's the consequence of the professional life I've led; the profession first, the rest nowhere. You may beat against this heart for years, and yet not find entrance.' He banged his hand against his side. I should have thought it hurt him. 'I'm a man who only believes what he sees--and only about a quarter of that. Therefore, when I tell you that I am possessed by an overwhelming, a predominating conviction that something has happened to your husband, you will know that my conviction is not a thing to be laughed at.'

'But what can have happened to him?'

'As I was going home yesterday afternoon, I slipped on a piece of orange peel; that means danger. In our street I saw three black cats; that means mourning for a friend. I found myself putting my walking-stick upside down into the stand; that means trouble. When I got upstairs, death stared me in the face out of my sitting-room fire. As I was smoking a pipe, your husband's portrait fell from its place on the wall, and chipped a piece off one of the corners; you know what that means as well as I do. I'll say nothing about the horrid dreams which haunted me all through the night because I'm not a superstitious man, and they may have had something to do with the dressed crab I had for supper. But I will say this, that I woke up this morning profoundly persuaded that there is something wrong. And that persuasion is with me now.'

'But what can be wrong?'

He came and leaned against the edge of the table.

'Mind the flour,' I said.

He waved his hand.

'What does it matter about minding the flour when we've got such facts as those to face? Mrs. Merrett, we have to put two and two together. I unhesitatingly say that the result of our doing that is to point the finger of suspicion towards the man who masqueraded as John Smith.' He rapped his knuckles so hard against the board that a piece of suet which I had left there stuck to them. 'If you don't go to Mr. John Smith, alias the Hon. Douglas Howarth, and ask him, as I asked him, what he's done with Mr. Babbacombe, you'll be neglecting your duty as a wife.'

'Mr. FitzHoward!'

'You will, Mrs. Merrett, you will! If you love your husband----'

'"If!"'

'I say, if you love your husband you will insist on getting from him the answer which he refused to give me. There's a mystery, Mrs. Merrett--a mystery; and that double-named gentleman is at the back of it. My varied experience in all branches of the profession has given me the eyes of a hawk, and yesterday I saw right through him.'

'But, Mr. FitzHoward----'

'But me no buts. If you won't go I will; and I'll try to conceal the fact that I've come because you wouldn't. There are wives like that, but I didn't think that you were one.'

I stood up, and I hit the table with the rolling-pin. I was not going to stand talk like that from him, or from anyone.'

'Mr. FitzHoward, I know my James, and he won't thank you for interfering with his private affairs, nor me either. If you come to mysteries, why, his whole life's a mystery: but he'll be the first to tell you not to trouble yourself about him, but to look after mysteries of your own.'

'What if he's dead?'

'Mr. FitzHoward! how can you say such things? What makes you think it?'

'I don't want to agitate you; I don't want to cause alarm. But I have my intuitions--here.' He tapped his shirt front. 'What surprises me is that you haven't got intuitions, too.'

'What makes you--have them?'

'My trained intelligence. If all's well there'll be no harm done by your running round to Brook Street, and putting that question to the Hon. Douglas Howarth. If he's able to clear himself--which, mind, I hope!--he'll have my congratulations, and you too. No one can blame the anxiety of a loving woman's heart. And I can only say that if I were in your position, knowing what you know, and what I know, I shouldn't be able to lay my head upon my pillow this night, if I was weighed down by the consciousness that I hadn't moved a finger to find out whether my husband was alive or dead. I shouldn't dare to go to sleep.'

Oh, dear, how that man did work upon my feelings! How he did upset me! He almost drove me to hysterics. Goodness knows that often and often I've laid awake all night, wondering if James was dead, and, if so, where he was buried, sopping my pillow with my tears, and making myself quite ill. But I never had been talked to like that man talked to me that afternoon. I was half beside myself through not knowing what I ought to do. I knew very well that I should get into trouble with James if it turned out that he was only carrying on as usual; while if what Mr. FitzHoward kept talking about was true, or anything like it, I should never forgive myself for leaving the least thing undone that I could do.

The end of it was that I was over-persuaded. He got me into such a state that I didn't dare to hold out any longer; and though I was trembling in my shoes to think I had the courage, I decided to go with him to see that Mr. Howarth. I gave the children their dinner--the roly-poly had to be put off to supper-time--I never had a chance to cook it. Mr. FitzHoward went away to have his dinner. I washed and tidied the children--they are pictures when they're tidy!--and took them round to Mrs. Ordish, to stop with her till I came back. She hasn't any of her own, and very glad she was to have them--as who wouldn't be? Then, when Mr. FitzHoward came back I was ready to start.

He would have a hansom cab. Simply, I believe, that he could keep on talking to me, and working of me up. Then, as we were getting near the house, he said:

'You understand? You're to go in, and I'm to wait outside. Then when I think you've had time to put your question, and receive a satisfactory explanation, if you don't appear I'll come in too. If between us we don't make him sit up I'll be surprised. I'll be even with him for setting that copper on me yesterday.'

I really do believe that that was at the bottom of it all; his wanting to be even, as he called it, with the gentleman for calling to the policeman. And at the last moment, if I'd dared, I'd have gone straight back then and there, and never have gone into the house at all. But that was more than I had courage for, having come all that way, with Mr. FitzHoward, and him saying all those things.

So I left him at the corner, and went to the number he'd told me of. It wasn't a large house, quite the other way; I shouldn't have thought that an Earl's son would have lived in such a small one. The door was opened by a gentleman whom I at first took to be Mr. Howarth himself; but then supposed to be a servant--though he wasn't dressed like one, being just in evening clothes. He looked at me so that I wished right straight away that I'd never come.

'Mr. Howarth?' I just managed to get out.

'Mr. Howarth? Not at home. What name?'

I was stammering that it didn't matter, and was going to take myself away, and glad to get the chance of doing it, when a young lady came out of the side room into the passage. She was quite the lady, though dressed as plain as plain could be, with not a scrap of jewellery about her. When she saw me standing on the step, she said to the gentleman who had opened the door:

'Bartlett, who is this?'

'Wants to see Mr. Howarth, my lady.'

She came to the door and looked at me again.

'On what subject do you wish to see Mr. Howarth? I am his sister.'

The servant's calling her 'my lady' had sent me all of a twitter. So that when she spoke to me I felt that silly I could have bitten myself.

'If you please, miss, I want to speak to him.'

I could have scratched myself for calling her miss, she being my lady. But she didn't seem to mind. She had another look at me, and then she said:

'Come in. Perhaps you can tell me on what subject you wish to speak to my brother.' I followed her into the room she had just come out of. There was another lady in it; but, except that somehow I knew that she was older than the other, I didn't take any notice of what she was like. 'Now, is there any message which you can give me and which I can deliver to my brother?'

She looked at me so straight, and with such an odd something in her eyes, that I grew more confused than ever.

'If you please, miss, I mean my lady, I only wanted to ask him what he's done with my husband.'

'You only wanted to ask him what?'

'What he's done with my husband.'

I had to put my handkerchief up to my eyes. But it was as much rage as anything; through my feeling such a fool, and, no doubt, looking one. The young lady glanced at the other. I knew what she was thinking, and small blame to her; I could have boxed Mr. FitzHoward's ears for getting me into such a mess.

'I don't understand you. Who are you? And what has my brother to do with your husband?'

'If you please, miss, I mean my lady, my name's Merrett; but my husband's known as Mr. Montagu Babbacombe. He's the famous Mr. Montagu Babbacombe.'

I've a sort of suspicion that the young lady smiled.

'The famous Mr. Montagu Babbacombe? I am afraid that his fame has not reached me. And what has my brother to do with Mr. Babbacombe?'

'That's what I want to know.'

'Where is your husband?'

'I want to know that too.'

'Do you mean that he's left home?'

'I haven't seen or heard of him since he went out last Sunday week to see your brother.'

'To see my brother? How do you know that he went to see my brother?'

'He had an interview at the York Hotel with your brother, who called himself Mr. John Smith.'

'My brother called himself Mr. John Smith?'

'Yes, my lady; and yesterday when Mr. FitzHoward saw him in Piccadilly----'

'Who's Mr. FitzHoward?'

'My husband's business manager. He went up to him and asked him what he'd been doing with my husband. And he was so struck all of a heap, and went on in such a way, that Mr. FitzHoward felt sure that he'd been doing something he didn't ought to. Then he found out that his name wasn't Smith at all, but Howarth; so he brought me here to ask what he's been doing to my James.'

The young lady, turning to the older one, made a queer movement with her hands.

'I don't understand her in the very faintest atom; do you? Do you think she's--quite right in her mind?'

'Hush!' said the other.

She came to me. And I saw that she wasn't so very old after all. While for loveliness I had never seen anything like her. Compared to her I was like a doll. She was beautifully dressed, and she had a way about her I can't describe. And such a voice it did you good to hear her speak.

'Sit down, my dear,' she said. I sat down, and she sat down beside me. 'Now tell me all about it from the beginning. Where do you live?'

'At 32 Little Olive Street, Vauxhall Bridge Road.'

'And you say that your name is Merrett, and your husband is known as Mr. Montagu Babbacombe. What is he?'

'Anything and everything.'

'That's rather vague.'

'The last thing he did was a thirty days' sleep at the Royal Aquarium.'

'A thirty days' sleep. Now I think I begin to understand. I remember reading something about it in the papers. So that was your husband?'

'That was my James. And that was where Mr. Smith--or Mr. Howarth, as it seems that he is--first saw him.'

'Indeed! And when did he first see him? On what day?'

'Let me see. It was the Thursday before he went away--that was a fortnight last Thursday.'

'A fortnight last Thursday?'

The young lady burst out with something I didn't understand.

'How very odd! That was the day on which he first saw Twickenham.'

The other lady was silent for, I should think, quite a minute. And when she did speak her voice seemed changed.

'Yes; it is odd. At that time your husband was giving an exhibition as--what?'

'As a sleeping man.'

'As a sleeping man? What a strange thing to do! What kind of man is your husband? Is he old?'

'He's older than I am.'

'Older than you are? About forty?'

'About that, I should think.'

'Have you known him all your life?'

'I've been married six years, and I only knew him a week before we were married.'

'Only a week! What a courageous thing to do! Do you know his relatives?'

'I don't think he has any. I never heard him speak of them. The only thing I know about him is that he's a gentleman.'

'What do you understand by a gentleman?'

'I can't explain. But I know a gentleman when I see him, and I'm sure my James is one.'

She seemed to hesitate before she put her next question.

'When he went out that Sunday morning was he well?'

'He was never better.'

'Did he suffer from a weak heart?'

'He's never had an hour's illness during all the time I've known him.'

Somehow I don't think that was just the answer she expected. She kind of drew her breath, as if she was relieved. The young lady interrupted.

'I don't know, Edith, what it is you're driving at, nor do I as yet at all understand how, or why, Mrs. Merrett associates Douglas with her husband.'

'Nor I. But here comes Douglas to answer for himself.'

As she said it the room door opened, and in came a gentleman. He was very tall, and his brown hair, which was curly, was just turning grey; as, likewise, was his big moustache, which turned up at the ends. His good looks were not what I had expected: and his sweet smile reminded me of the lady who had been asking me questions. Somehow he looked worried--downright ill, indeed; and he had a queer way of starting at nothing, and looking about him, as if he saw and heard something which you didn't, which would soon have got upon my nerves.

'Douglas,' said the young lady, 'here is some one who wishes to ask you a question.'

She spoke as if she was sure he'd find the question an amusing one. But as soon as I set eyes upon him I knew better. Although he smiled at the two ladies as he came in, all the while he was glancing at me in a fidgety sort of way as if he resented my intruding.

'Indeed!' he said. 'And who may this lady be?'

'You had better ask her. She will be able to tell you better than I can. I am so stupid that I'm quite unable to understand.'

When he came in, the lady, who had been asking me questions, had moved a little to one side. I stood up and faced him. Although he was so big and tall, and quite the great gentleman, somehow I was not half so afraid as I had expected to be. I gave him look for look.

'You wish to see me?'

'Yes, sir.'

'In private?'

'That, sir, is for you to say.' The young lady put in a word.

'I don't think, Douglas, that any privacy is necessary. Mrs. Merrett merely wishes to ask you a plain and simple question.'

He repeated my name.

'Merrett? Merrett? Are you Mrs. Merrett?'

'I am, sir. And I'm the wife of Mr. Montagu Babbacombe.'

Just what Mr. FitzHoward had spoken of happened again. He sort of reeled; and a look came on to his face which was shocking. I never saw a man so changed all of a sudden. I thought he was going to have a fit. The two ladies were every bit as much surprised as I was. The younger one went hurrying to him.

'Douglas, what ever is the matter?' He seemed to have a difficulty in speaking, as though his breath was short.

'I--I've not felt very well to-day; that's all.'

'It's the first time you've spoken of it. Shall I send for the doctor?'

'No. It's nothing. It's only a passing touch.' He tried to brace himself up: but though he tried hard he still seemed limp. 'If you will come to my room, Mrs.--what did you say your name was?'

'Merrett, sir.'

'If you will come into my room, Mrs. Merrett, I will speak to you there.'

'Douglas,' said the elder of the ladies, just as he had his hand upon the handle of the door, 'who is Mr. Montagu Babbacombe?'

'Babbacombe?' He tried to meet her eyes: but couldn't. 'Oh, he's a wretched mountebank.'

It fired my blood to hear him speak of my James like that.

'Begging your pardon, sir, but he's nothing of the kind. And if that's the way you're going to speak of my husband I'd rather say what I have to say before the ladies.'

'I dare say you would; but you won't. You will come into my own room, Mrs. Merrett.'

'Excuse me, sir, but I will not. You can tell me just as well here as anywhere what it is you've done with my husband.'