Where could the mater be?  And what could she be doing?

For a moment he thought of returning to his room, shutting himself in and waiting for the dawn, which would change everything—­would make everything seem quite usual and reasonable.  But something in the depths of him, speaking in a disagreeably distinct voice, remarked, “That’s right!  Be a funk stick!” And his young cheeks flushed red, although he was alone.  Immediately he went out on to the landing, thrust his feet again into the red slippers, and boldly started down the stairs into the black depths below.  Holding the candle tightly, and trying to shuffle with manly decision, he explored the sitting-rooms and the dining-room.  All of them were empty and dark.

Now Jimmy began to feel “rotten.”  Horrid fears for his mother bristled up in his mind.  His young imagination got to work and summoned up ugly things before him.  He saw his mother ravished away from him by unspeakable men—­Turks, Armenians, Greeks, Albanians—­God knows whom—­and carried off to some unknown and frightful fate; he saw her dead, murdered; he saw her dead, stricken by some sudden and horrible illness.  His heart thumped.  He could hear it.  It seemed to be beating in his ears.  And then he began to feel brave, to feel an intrepidity of desperation.  He must act.  That was certain.  It was his obvious business to jolly well get to work and do something.  His first thought was to rush upstairs, to rouse the servants, to call up Sonia, his mother’s confidential maid, to—­the pavilion!

Suddenly he remembered the pavilion, and all the books on its shelves.  His mother might be there.  She might have been sleepless, might have felt sure she couldn’t sleep, and so have stayed up.  She might be reading in the darkness.  She was afraid of nothing.  Darkness and solitude wouldn’t hinder her from wandering about if the fancy to wander took her.  She wouldn’t, of course, go outside the gates, but—­he now felt sure she was somewhere in the garden.

He looked round.  He was standing by the grand piano in the drawing-room, and he now noticed for the first time that the French window which gave on to the rose garden was open.  That settled it.  He put the candle down, hurried out into the garden and called, “Mater!”

No voice replied except the fountain’s voice.  The purring water rose in the darkness and fell among the lilies, rose and fell, active and indifferent, like a living thing withdrawn from him, wrapped in its own mystery.

“Mater!” he called again, in a louder, more resolute, voice.  “Mater!  Mater!”

* * * * *

In an absolutely still night a voice can travel very far.  On the highest terrace of the garden in the blackness of the pavilion Mrs. Clarke moved sharply.  She sat straight up on the divan, rigid, with her hands pressed palm downwards on the cushions.  Dion had heard nothing, and did not understand the reason for her abrupt, almost violent, movement.