"Headed for these very windows!" I said firmly. He crossed to the long French casements and tried the fastenings, which were long bars that crossed them at two levels, making entrance impossible without breaking the leaded glass. They were undisturbed. The great rose window was, of course, impenetrable, both by construction and because of its height from the ground. "It is all quite secure, miss," said he. "And the beggars will be frightened off by now, I think, for they will have seen the light." "Look here, Wilkes, my man!" I said sharply. "If you were down here on a burglar hunt, why were you looking for them in the frame of the Madonna of the Lamp?" He must have been prepared for that, for he replied composedly enough, with downcast eyes. "I inadvertently stopped to have a look at it, miss," said he. "I have a liking for fine pictures, miss." "Well, I suppose that's all right enough," I said, still somehow very much troubled in my mind, I scarcely knew why. "A love of art is probably one of the requisites in newfangled help, but dear knows Galadia never showed any! Well, be that as it may, we'd better make the round of the house and be sure that everything is safe!" "Very well, miss!" said he. "But need you come, miss? I'll just find the watchman--he's usually in the back hall." "Well, I'll go that far with you," I compromised. "I want to make sure that he thinks everything is all right before I go to bed." "Very well, miss," said Wilkes again. But I could not help feeling he was uncommonly anxious to get rid of me. Switching the lights on ahead of us as we went, and revealing the cheerful normal aspect of the house as it really was, composed my nerves to a considerable extent; and finding the watchman at his post in the back hall was also reassuring. One thing struck me as curious, however. The man, a Latin of some sort, was not dozing in the expected manner of night watchmen, curled upon a comfortable chair or nodding over an extinct pipe. He was standing in the middle of the floor, knocking one boot against the other, and though the door, leading presumably to the kitchen garden, was shut I at once got a strong impression of his having been out of doors a moment before. There was that waft of fresh air that comes in with a person from the coolness of the night clinging to his clothing, and the room itself was fresh instead of close as might have been anticipated. This in itself was, of course, in no way extraordinary, and might indeed have passed unnoticed had it not been for what he said. "Everything all right, Pedro?" asked Wilkes, who had entered ahead of me. "Yas--was' ell matt'?" replied the fellow, evidently surprised by having visitors at such an hour. "You tink you hear sometin'?" "Yes--Miss Talbot saw two men in the garden--and I also thought I heard something out of the ordinary--someone breaking in--like at a lower window." "No--no!" said Pedro. "Everytin' all ri'. Me just maka da round."