Mrs. Bruce paused, coffee-cup in hand, and looked at the cook, but did not speak. “All right, Alice,” said Irving carelessly. “She has run into a neighbor’s.” “No, sir, it looks queer up there,” returned the girl, her brogue increasing. “The bedclothes is all folded. Not a thing is on the dresser, sir. She’s _gone_.” Alice’s blank expression began to be reflected in Irving’s face. “Folded? What does that signify?” he asked. “’Tis her trunk there too, sir. Locked and strapped it is. Sure she niver said a word to me!” Irving pushed his chair back from the table. He looked at Mrs. Bruce. She had grown very white. “Very well, Alice,” he said quietly. “I’ll see what it means. Thank you. You may go.” The Irish girl withdrew, marvelling as she went. Robert looked from mother to son, puzzled at their seriousness. “Did you know this, Madama?” “Certainly not,” she replied stiffly. “Do you believe it?” “I don’t know what to think. Betsy grows more erratic every day. She didn’t bring my hot water this morning.” Irving studied her face an instant more, then he left the room and ran upstairs to Betsy’s room. It was dismantled. The dresser, where a flexible case had always stood open, containing six pictures of himself from babyhood to college days, was bare, even of a cover. A trunk, locked and strapped, stood a little way out from the bare wall. Irving sat down on it in the desolate chamber, unnerved by the shock; and although the riddle seemed a horribly easy one to solve, the solution was so repulsive that he prayed to find another explanation. Mrs. Bruce’s early disappearance from the inn, her heavy eyes this morning, Betsy’s warnings and exhortations to him in the Park, and Mrs. Bruce’s exhibition of unfriendliness to Rosalie last night, all pointed to one conclusion. His teeth clenched as he sat there, thinking back from his earliest remembrance, and all along through his life, of the unselfish care which a fine nature had devoted to his family. And this was the end. It was a nightmare. It was impossible, unthinkable. Robert Nixon, left alone with his hostess, had seldom spent a more uncomfortable season than that first five minutes after Irving’s departure. Mrs. Bruce stared straight before her, her face wearing an expression of fright and obstinacy. Robert, with increasing embarrassment, began to feel that he was in the midst of some mysterious crisis, and fervently wished himself in the bosom of his family at the inn. “I’m sorry to see you look so tired, Mrs. Bruce,” he said, when the long minutes had made the silence impossible. “Shouldn’t you think he’d come down by this time?” she asked in a strained voice. “You see how it is, Nixie. Betsy rules this household with a rod of iron. Here is Irving upset, won’t eat his breakfast, just because she has taken a notion for an early stroll.” Robert did not answer, and a cuckoo popping out of its door and remarking that it was half-past nine, made him jump nervously.