David Steel followed his guide with the feelings of the man who has given himself over to circumstances. There was a savour of nightmare about the whole thing that appealed distinctly to his imagination. The darkness, the strange situation, the vivid streaks of the crimson blinds—the crimson blind that seemed an integral part of the mystery—all served to stimulate him. The tragic note was deepened by the whine and howling of the dogs.

"There is a man over there," David whispered.

"A man who is going to stay there," Enid said, with grim satisfaction. "It is virtually necessary that Mr. Reginald Henson should not be disturbed. The dogs have a foolish weakness for his society. So long as he shows no signs of boredom he is safe."

David smiled with a vague grasp of the situation. Apparently the cue was to be surprised at nothing that he saw about the House of the Silent Sorrow. The name of Reginald Henson was more or less familiar to him as that of a man who stood high in public estimation. But the bitter contempt in his companion's voice suggested that there was another side to the man's character.

"I hope you are not asking me to do anything wrong," David murmured.

"I am absolutely certain of it," the girl said. "It is a case of the end justifying the means; and if ever the end justified the means, it does in this case. Besides—"

Enid Henson hesitated. David's quick perception prompted him.

"Besides, it is my suggestion," he said. "When I had the pleasure of seeing you before—"

"Pardon me, you have never had the pleasure of seeing me before."

"Ah, you would make an excellent Parliamentary fencer. I bow to your correction and admit that I have never seen you before. But your voice reminds me of a voice I heard very recently under remarkable circumstances. It was my good fortune to help a lady in distress a little time back. If she had told me more I might have aided her still further. As it is, her reticence has landed me into serious trouble."

Enid grasped the speaker's arm convulsively.

"I am deeply sorry to hear it," she whispered. "Perhaps the lady in question was reticent for your sake. Perhaps she had confided more thoroughly in good men before. And suppose those good men had disappeared?"

"In other words, that they had been murdered. Who by?"

There was a snarl from one of the hounds hard by, and a deep, angry curse from Henson. Enid pointed solemnly in his direction. No words of hers would have been so thrilling and eloquent. David strode along without further questions on that head.

"But there is one thing that you must tell me," he said, as they stood together in the porch. "Is the first part of my advice going to be carried out?"

"Yes. That is why you are here now. Stay here one moment whilst I get you pencil and paper… There! Now will you please write what I suggest? Dr. Bell is with my sister. At least, I suppose he is with her, as Dr. Walker desired to have his opinion. My sister is dying—dying, you understand?"

Enid's voice had sunk to a passionate whisper. The hand that she laid on David's shoulder was trembling strangely. At that moment he would've done anything for her. A shaft of light filtered from the hall into the porch, and lit up the paper that the girl thrust upon Steel.

"Now write," she commanded. "Ask no questions, but write what I ask, and trust me implicitly."

David nodded. After all, he reflected, he could not possibly get himself into a worse mess than he was in already. And he felt that he could trust the girl by his side. Her beauty, her earnestness, and her obvious sincerity touched him.

"Write," Enid whispered. "Say, 'See nothing and notice nothing, I implore you. Only agree with everything that Dr. Walker says, and leave the room as quickly as possible!' Now sign your name. We can go into the drawing-room and wait till Dr. Bell comes down. You are merely a friend of his. I will see that he has this paper at once."

Enid led the way into the drawing-room. She gave no reasons for the weird strangeness of the place, it was no time for explanations. As for Steel, he gazed around him in fascinated astonishment. A novelist ever on the look-out for new scenes and backgrounds, the aspect of the room fascinated him. He saw the dust rising in clouds, he saw the wilted flowers, he noted the overturned table, obviously untouched and neglected for years, and he wondered. Then he heard the babel of discordant voices overhead. What a sad house it was, and how dominant was the note of tragedy.

Meanwhile, with no suspicion of the path he was treading, Bell had gone upstairs. He came at length to the door of the room where the sick girl lay. There was a subdued light inside and the faint suggestion of illness that clings to the chamber of the sufferer. Bell caught a glimpse of a white figure lying motionless in bed. It was years now since he had acted thus in a professional capacity, but the old quietness and caution came back by instinct. As he would have entered Margaret Henson came out and closed the door.

"You are not going in there," she said. "No, no. Everything of mine you touch you blight and wither. If the girl is to die, let her die in peace."

She would have raised her voice high, but a lightning glance from Bell quieted her. It was not exactly madness that he had to deal with, and he knew it. The woman required firm, quiet treatment. Dr. Walker stood alongside, anxious and nervous. The man with the quiet practice of the well-to-do doctor was not used to scenes of this kind.

"You have something to conceal," Bell said, sternly. "Open the door."

"Really, my dear sir," Walker said, fussily. "Really, I fancy that under the circumstances—"

"You don't understand this kind of case," Bell interrupted. "I do."

Walker dropped aside with a muttered apology. Bell approached the figure in the doorway and whispered a few words rapidly in her ear. The effect was electrical. The figure seemed to wilt and shrivel up, all the power and resistance had gone. She stepped aside, moaning and wringing her hands. She babbled of strange things; the old, far-away look came into her eyes again.

Without a word of comment or sign of triumph Bell entered the sick room. Then he raised his head and sniffed the heavy atmosphere as an eager hound might have done. A quick, sharp question rose to his lips, only to be instantly suppressed as he noted the vacant glance of his colleague.

The white figure on the bed lay perfectly motionless. It was the figure of a young and exceedingly beautiful girl, a beauty heightened and accentuated by the dead-white pallor of her features. Still the face looked resolute and the exquisitely chiselled lips were firm.

"Albumen," Bell muttered. "What fiend's game is this? I wonder if that scoundrel—but, no. In that case there would be no object in concealing my presence here. I wonder—"

He paused and touched the pure white brow with his fingers. At the same moment Enid came into the room. She panted like one who has run fast and far.

"Well," she whispered, "is she better, better or—Hatherly, read this."

The last words were so low that Bell hardly heard them. He shot a swift glance at his colleague before he opened the paper. One look and he had mastered the contents. Then the swift glance was directed from Walker to the girl standing there looking at Bell with a world of passionate entreaty and longing in her eyes.

"It is your sister who lies there," Bell whispered, meaningly, "and yet you—"

He paused, and Enid nodded. There was evidently a great struggle going on in Bell's mind. He was grappling with something that he only partially understood, but he did know perfectly well that he was being asked to do something absolutely wrong and that he was going to yield for the sake of the girl he loved.

He rose abruptly from the bedside and crossed over to Walker.

"You are perfectly correct," he said. "At this rate—at this rate the patient cannot possibly last till the morning. It is quite hopeless."

Walker smiled feebly.

"It is a melancholy satisfaction to have my opinion confirmed," he said. "Miss Henson, if you will get Williams to see me as far as the lodge-gates … it is so late that—er—"

Williams came at length, and the little doctor departed. Enid fairly cowered before the blazing, searching look that Bell turned upon her. She fell to plucking the bedclothes nervously.

"What does it mean?" he asked, hoarsely. "What fiend's plaything are you meddling with? Don't you know that if that girl dies it will be murder? It was only for your sake that I didn't speak my mind before the fool who has just gone. He has seen murder done under his eyes for days, and he is ready to give a certificate of the cause of death. And the strange thing is that in the ordinary way he would be quite justified in doing so."

"Chris is not going to die; at least, not in that way," Enid whispered, hoarsely.

"Then leave her alone. No more drugs; no medicine even. Give Nature a chance. Thank Heaven, the girl has a perfect constitution."

"Chris is not going to die," Enid repeated, doggedly, "but the certificate will be given, all the same. Oh, Hatherly, you must trust me—trust me as you have never done before. Look at me, study me. Did you ever know me to do a mean or dishonourable thing?"

They were down in the drawing-room again; David waiting, with a strange sense of embarrassment under Margaret Henson's distant eyes; indeed, it was probable that she had never noticed him at all. All the same she turned eagerly to Bell.

"Tell me the worst," she cried. "Tell me all there is to know."

"Your niece's sufferings are over," Bell said, gravely; "I have no more to tell you."

A profound silence followed, broken presently by angry voices outside. Then Williams looked in at the door and beckoned Enid to him. His face was wreathed in an uneasy grin.

"Mr. Henson has got away," he said. "Blest if I can say how. And they dogs have rolled him about, and tore his clothes, and made such a picture of him as you never saw. And a sweet temper he's in!"

"Where is he now?" Enid asked. "There are people here he must not see."

"Well, he came back in through the study window, swearing dreadful for so respectable a gentleman. And he went right up to his room, after ordering whisky and soda-water."

Enid flew back to the drawing-room. Not a moment was to be lost. At any hazard Reginald Henson must be kept in ignorance of the presence of strangers. A minute later, and the darkness of the night had swallowed them up. Williams fastened the lodge-gates behind them, and they turned their faces in the direction of Rottingdean Road.

"A strange night's work," David said, presently.

"Aye, but pregnant with result," Bell answered. There was a stern, exulting ring in his voice. "There is much to do and much danger to be faced, but we are on the right track at last. But why did you send me that note just now?"

David smiled as he lighted a cigarette.

"It is part of the scheme," he said. "Part of my scheme, you understand.
But, principally, I sent you the note because Miss Enid asked me to."