The very next day, as it happened, Mr. Ranford called.  The footman said the three were very merry over their tea in the library, and Mr. Brympton strolled down to the gate with Mr. Ranford when he left.

I have said that things went on as usual; and so they did with the rest of the household; but as for myself, I had never been the same since the night my bell had rung.  Night after night I used to lie awake, listening for it to ring again, and for the door of the locked room to open stealthily.  But the bell never rang, and I heard no sound across the passage.  At last the silence began to be more dreadful to me than the most mysterious sounds.  I felt that someone were cowering there, behind the locked door, watching and listening as I watched and listened, and I could almost have cried out, “Whoever you are, come out and let me see you face to face, but don’t lurk there and spy on me in the darkness!”

Feeling as I did, you may wonder I didn’t give warning.  Once I very nearly did so; but at the last moment something held me back.  Whether it was compassion for my mistress, who had grown more and more dependent on me, or unwillingness to try a new place, or some other feeling that I couldn’t put a name to, I lingered on as if spell-bound, though every night was dreadful to me, and the days but little better.

For one thing, I didn’t like Mrs. Brympton’s looks.  She had never been the same since that night, no more than I had.  I thought she would brighten up after Mr. Brympton left, but though she seemed easier in her mind, her spirits didn’t revive, nor her strength either.  She had grown attached to me, and seemed to like to have me about; and Agnes told me one day that, since Emma Saxon’s death, I was the only maid her mistress had taken to.  This gave me a warm feeling for the poor lady, though after all there was little I could do to help her.

After Mr. Brympton’s departure, Mr. Ranford took to coming again, though less often than formerly.  I met him once or twice in the grounds, or in the village, and I couldn’t but think there was a change in him too; but I set it down to my disordered fancy.

The weeks passed, and Mr. Brympton had now been a month absent.  We heard he was cruising with a friend in the West Indies, and Mr. Wace said that was a long way off, but though you had the wings of a dove and went to the uttermost parts of the earth, you couldn’t get away from the Almighty.  Agnes said that as long as he stayed away from Brympton, the Almighty might have him and welcome; and this raised a laugh, though Mrs. Blinder tried to look shocked, and Mr. Wace said the bears would eat us.