She went back to her room, seeing nothing but her own gliding shadow, hearing nothing but her own stealthy footfall in the midnight stillness of the house.  After mechanically putting the keys away in their former hiding-place, she looked toward her bed, and turned away from it, shuddering.  The warning remembrance of what she had suffered that morning in the garden was vividly present to her mind.  “Another chance tried,” she thought to herself, “and another chance lost!  I shall break down again if I think of it; and I shall think of it if I lie awake in the dark.”  She had brought a work-box with her to St. Crux, as one of the many little things which in her character of a servant it was desirable to possess; and she now opened the box and applied herself resolutely to work.  Her want of dexterity with her needle assisted the object she had in view; it obliged her to pay the closest attention to her employment; it forced her thoughts away from the two subjects of all others which she now dreaded most—­herself and the future.

The next day, as he had arranged, the admiral returned.  His visit to London had not improved his spirits.  The shadow of some unconquerable doubt still clouded his face; his restless tongue was strangely quiet, while Magdalen waited on him at his solitary meal.  That night the snoring resounded once more on the inner side of the screen, and old Mazey was back again in the comfortless truckle-bed.

Three more days passed—­April came.  On the second of the month —­returning as unexpectedly as he had departed a week before—­Mr. George Bartram re-appeared at St. Crux.

He came back early in the afternoon, and had an interview with his uncle in the library.  The interview over, he left the house again, and was driven to the railway by the groom in time to catch the last train to London that night.  The groom noticed, on the road, that “Mr. George seemed to be rather pleased than otherwise at leaving St. Crux.”  He also remarked, on his return, that the admiral swore at him for overdriving the horses—­an indication of ill-temper, on the part of his master, which he described as being entirely without precedent in all his former experience.  Magdalen, in her department of service, had suffered in like manner under the old man’s irritable humor:  he had been dissatisfied with everything she did in the dining-room; and he had found fault with all the dishes, one after another, from the mutton-broth to the toasted cheese.

The next two days passed as usual.  On the third day an event happened.  In appearance, it was nothing more important than a ring at the drawing-room bell.  In reality, it was the forerunner of approaching catastrophe—­the formidable herald of the end.

It was Magdalen’s business to answer the bell.  On reaching the drawing-room door, she knocked as usual.  There was no reply.  After again knocking, and again receiving no answer, she ventured into the room, and was instantly met by a current of cold air flowing full on her face.  The heavy sliding door in the opposite wall was pushed back, and the Arctic atmosphere of Freeze-your-Bones was pouring unhindered into the empty room.