When he was gone Mrs. De Peyster lay wordless, limp, all a-shiver.  Beside her sat the limp and voiceless Matilda, gasping and staring wildly.  How long Mrs. De Peyster lay in that condition she never knew.  All her faculties were reeling.  These crowding events seemed the wildest series of unrealities; seemed the frenzied, feverish phantasms of a nightmare.  They never, never could possibly-have happened!

But then ... they had happened!  And this hard, narrow bed was real.  And this low, narrow room was real.  And Mr. Pyecroft was real.  And so were Jack, and Mary, and Judge Harvey.

These things could never have happened.  But, then, they had.  And would they ever, ever stop happening?

This was only the eighth day since her promulgated sailing.  Three more months, ninety days of twenty-four hours each, before Olivetta—­

“Matilda,” she burst out in a despairing whisper, “I can’t stand this another minute!”

“Oh, ma’am!” wailed Matilda.

“That Mr. Pyecroft—­” Words failed her.  “I’ve simply got to get out of this somehow!”

“Of course, ma’am.  But—­but our changes haven’t helped us much yet.  If we tried to leave the house, that Mr. Pyecroft might follow and we might find ourselves even in a worse way than we are, ma’am.”

“Nothing can be worse than this!”

“I’m not so sure, ma’am,” tremulously doubted Matilda.  “We never dreamed anything could be so bad as this, but here this is.”

There was a vague logic in what Matilda said; but logic none the less.  Unbelievable, and yet so horribly actual as this was,—­was what had thus far happened only the legato and pianissimo passages of their adventure, with crescendo and fortissimo still ahead?  Mrs. De Peyster closed her eyes, and did not speak.  She strove to regain some command over her routed faculties.

Matilda waited.

Presently Mrs. De Peyster’s eyes opened.  “It would be some relief”—­weak hope was in her voice—­“if only I could manage to get down into my own suite.”

“But, ma’am, with that Mr. Pyecroft—­”

“He’s a risk we’ve got to run,” Mrs. De Peyster cried desperately.  “We’ve somehow got to manage to get me there without his knowing it.”

Suddenly she sat up.  The hope that a moment before had shone faintly in her face began to become a more confident glow.  Matilda saw that her mistress was thinking; therefore she remained silent, expectant.

“Matilda, I think there’s a chance!” Mrs. De Peyster exclaimed after a moment.  “I’ll get into my suite—­I’ll live there quiet as death.  Since they believe the suite empty, since they know it is locked, they may never suspect any one is in it.  Matilda, it’s the only way!”

“Yes—­but, ma’am, how am I to explain your sudden disappearance?”

“Say that your sister became homesick,” said Mrs. De Peyster with mounting hope, “and decided suddenly, in the middle of the night, to return at once to her home in Syracuse.”