Soon after coffee Jethro grew sleepy. He dozed spasmodically, shaking himself up at intervals, with apologetic murmurs. Pamela sat silent, her unringed hands on her lap, her eyes sadly on the coals. She resented the lack of drama in what she regarded as her home-coming. The long, varying walk had been so pregnant with possibilities. She had imagined, dreaded, dared to hope--so much. This was the end--Jethro, inert with food, sleeping like a tired dog in the armchair. Everything was settled. They had talked themselves out already. She was to stay; she was to be Cousin Pamela again. Whether they were really cousins or not they did not know--they had agreed not to trouble--it mattered not. She was back at Folly Corner. To-morrow she would pick up her dropped reins. She would go to Turle, to the Warren, to all the roomy, warm old houses; she would kiss again the placid, clumsy-souled woman. No one was to know the truth. Everything would be just as it had been before--except that there would be no question of love between her and Jethro. He tacitly insinuated that, and she as delicately agreed. It had all been conveyed by a look. When the clock struck ten, he shook himself up for the last time, stumbled to his feet, yawned openly, and said that it was late. Was she quite ready for bed? They went round the house together, winding the thirty-hour clock in the kitchen, which Gainah, strangely enough, had forgotten, trying bolts and locks, turning out lights. They went up the oak steps. At the door of the guest-room he kissed her calmly above the eyes. When she was half undressed she discovered that the bed had not been made. The blankets and quilt were there, but there were no sheets, no slips on the pillows. She was half amused and half angry, divining at once what had happened. Gainah with a last kick of authority had bidden the maids prepare the inferior room which had been hers in former days. She went softly along the corridor and into that room. The bed was made. She did not intend to sleep there: Gainah must be grasped with a firm hand from the very start. She set her candle down, peeled off the sheets, piled them with the pillows in her arms, and turned to go back to the guest-room. When she opened the door, a puff of wind--the draughty old house was full of strange gusts--blew out her candle. Before the candle blew out she noticed that the key was gone from the door.