"Hush, Mrs. Penn," I interrupted. Every impulse my mind possessed prompted me to deny the request utterly; to nip it in the bud. "It is what I cannot do. I might get very much frightened myself; but it is not that; it is that I am a visitor in the family, and would not pry into an affair that must no doubt be one of pain and annoyance to them. Don't you perceive that it would be dishonourable? I keep my curtains closed at night, you see; and no persuasion would induce me to allow them to be opened." "You are a foolish girl," she said, with good humour. "Hill locks up the other rooms at dusk: and if she did not, I should be too great a coward to watch alone in them. A love of the marvellous was born with me; I may say a terror of it; and my early training served to increase this. As a child I was allowed to read ghost stories; my nurse used to tell them in my hearing to her companions; of course it could but bear fruit. I think it perfectly wicked to allow such tales to penetrate to the impressionable imaginations of young children; they never wholly recover it." "But you cannot seriously believe in ghosts, Mrs. Penn!" "I should be ashamed to avow that I do believe in them. And yet the subject bears for me both a terror and a charm: nay, a strange fascination." That she spoke the truth now was evident; though I could not think she always did. I stood waiting for her to go. "And so you will not let me come, Miss Hereford! Well, perhaps you are right: it never occurred to me that the family might feel annoyed at it. Good-night." But I did not trust her: she might steal in while I slept: and I turned the key of my door inside for the first time since I was at Chandos. The next day was a gloomy one. Not as to weather; that was bright enough; but for me. Mr. Chandos was away. Gone out somewhere by rail, very far; and would not be back until night. "Is he well enough to bear the fatigue, Hickens?" I could not help asking the butler as he stood by me at breakfast. "Well, Miss, I should say he is _not_ well enough. Hill says it is some pressing business for my lady that he has gone upon; and Mr. Harry is one to go through with any duty, let him be well or ill; ay, though he died for it." Idling away the morning desultorily, I got through an hour or two. Was this new feeling making me worthless? Half ashamed of myself as the question flashed over me, I took out a German book of study, and settled down to it on a bench amid the thickest trees, not far from the entrance gates, and near the privet walk where I had once met Edwin Barley. While I was reading steadily, a voice began speaking at a little distance, and I recognised it for _his_. Edwin Barley's. Did he habitually come to the shady walk? The clump of thick shrubs, intervening, hid me from him, and him from me; for some minutes I could do nothing but give way to my fear; and did not dare to stir hand or foot.