‘What if my violin were enchanted now, and could play of itself?’ he thought idly. ‘Or what if the furies who torment me with the slow tortures of remorse had invented a new agony, that I should hear ghostly strains—mere phantasmal sounds—reminding me of the music I heard in the American forest?’ He put the violin back into its case, locked it, and put the key in his waistcoat-pocket. The lock was a Chubb. ‘Neither mortals nor fiends shall play upon you any more to-night, my little Amati,’ he said. He was glad to escape from the house presently, having no further business there. He felt that Lucille and the old man were securely guarded for that night at least. To-morrow might furnish a clue to the mystery—to-morrow might reveal the thief. The thought set his brain on fire. Who opened that door? Who admitted the midnight plunderer? Would to-morrow’s light bring with it the answer to that question? CHAPTER XI. AT FAULT. Geoffrey Hossack rushed down to Stillmington as fast as a recklessly-driven hansom and an express train could take him. His heart seemed to sing aloud as he went, ‘I am coming, my love, I am coming; and we will part no more.’ How sweet, how rustic, how peaceful, the little uncommercial town seemed to him to-day in its verdant setting; the low hills, on whose grassy slopes tall chestnuts spread their wide branches, and the dark foliage of the beech gleamed silvery as the warm breezes ruffled it; fertile pastures where the aftermath grew deep, green tinged with russet—over all the land late summer’s vanishing glory. ‘I could live here with her for ever,’ he thought; ‘ay, in the humblest cottage half hidden among those green lanes, which seem to lead nowhere. I could live all my life with her, cut off from all the rest of the world, and never languish for its hollow pleasures, and never sigh for change. God grant I may find her reasonable! God grant that she may accept my simple assurance of her release, and make me happy!’ On the very threshold of Mrs. Bertram’s modest dwelling a sudden fear seized him. Something in the aspect of the house to-day struck him as unfamiliar. The window was shut—an unusual circumstance, for Janet loved air. The flowers in the little rustic stand that screened the window had a neglected look. There were dead leaves on the geraniums, which were wont to be so carefully tended. The care of those flowers had been Janet’s early morning task. How often had he walked this way before breakfast, for the sake of catching one chance glimpse of the noble face bending over those flowers! ‘Good Heavens, can she be ill?’ he thought with agonising fear. He knocked softly, lest she should be indeed lying ill up-stairs and the sound of the knocker disturb her. The maid who opened the door had come straight from the washtub, breathless, with bare steaming arms. ‘Is Mrs. Bertram at home—and—and well?’ asked Geoffrey eagerly.