visit. I tell you again I don't know--on my sacred word of honour, I
don't know where Farnaby is. Oh, be quiet! be quiet! there's the doctor
going upstairs! don't let the doctor hear you!"

So far, she had succeeded in composing her husband. But the fury which
she had innocently roused in him, in her eagerness to justify herself,
now broke beyond all control. "You lie!" he cried furiously. "If you
know everything else about it, you know where Farnaby is. I'll be the
death of him, if I swing for it on the gallows! Where is he? Where is
he?"

A shriek from the upper room silenced him before Mrs. Ronald could
speak again. His daughter had heard him; his daughter had recognized
his voice.

A cry of terror from her mother echoed the cry from above; the sound of
the opening and closing of the door followed instantly. Then there was
a momentary silence. Then Mrs. Ronald's voice was heard from the upper
room calling to the nurse, asleep in the front parlour. The nurse's
gruff tones were just audible, answering from the parlour door. There
was another interval of silence; broken by another voice--a stranger's
voice--speaking at the open window, close by.

"Follow me upstairs, sir, directly," the voice said in peremptory
tones. "As your daughter's medical attendant, I tell you in the
plainest terms that you have seriously frightened her. In her critical
condition, I decline to answer for her life, unless you make the
attempt at least to undo the mischief you have done. Whether you mean
it or not, soothe her with kind words; say you have forgiven her. No! I
have nothing to do with your domestic troubles; I have only my patient