“What’s the matter?” cried the Prophet, his voice becoming not a little piercing from surprise and his previous stress of agitation.

“You can’t go in there, Miss Minerva,” requested the young librarian, who had now gained the parlour threshold, and who seemed about to take up a very determined stand thereon.

“I must go in—­I must,” said the lady, in a mellow, but again slightly Scottish, voice.  “Don’t tell anybody I’m here, or you’ll be sorry.”

And, with these words, she bounded into the parlour and banged the door on the young librarian.  The Prophet opened his lips preparatory to a third wild exclamation.

“Hush!” the lady hissed aristocratically.

She shook her head vigourously at him, sank down on one of the cane chairs, held up her right hand, and leant towards the door.  It was obvious that she was listening for something with strained attention, and so eloquent was her attitude that the two prophets were infected with her desire.  They turned their eyes mechanically towards the deal door and listened too.  For a moment there was silence.  Then a heavy footstep resounded upon the library floor, accompanied by the sharp tap of a walking stick.  The lady’s attitude became more tense and the pupils of her handsome grey eyes dilated.

“Has a young female just entered this shop?” said a very heavy and rumbling voice.

“This ain’t a shop, sir,” replied the high soprano of the young librarian, indignantly.

“Bandy no words with me, thou infamous malapert!” returned the first voice.  “But answer my question.  Have you a young female concealed within these loathsome precincts?”

Under ordinary circumstances it is very possible that the young librarian might have betrayed the lady as he had already betrayed Malkiel the Second.  But it happened that there existed upon the earth one object, and one object only, towards which he felt a sense of chivalry.  This object was Jellybrand’s Library.  His reply to the voice was therefore as follows, and was delivered in his highest key and with extreme volubility and passion:—­

“Loathsome precincts yourself!  You’re a nice one, you are, chasing respectable ladies about at your age.  There ain’t no young females in the library, and if there was I shouldn’t trot ’em out for you to clap your ugly old eyes on.  Now then, out yer go.  No more words about it.  Out yer go!”

A prolonged sound of hard breathing and of feet scraping violently upon bare boards followed upon this deliverance, complicated by the sharp snap of a breaking walking stick, the thump of a falling chair, a bang as of a heavy body encountering firm resistance from some inflexible article of furniture—­probably a bookcase—­and finally a tremendous thundering, as of the hoofs of a squadron of cavalry charging over a parquet floor, the crash of a door, the grinding of a key swiftly turning in a lock, and—­silence.

The lady, Malkiel the Second and the Prophet looked at one another, and the lady opened her mouth.