Sandie wanted to get married at once, but Robina had declared long before Elsa’s death that she could not bring herself to leave Miss Esperance, and now she felt that such a course was quite out of the question. Besides, she was in no hurry to get married. That she could get married, and well married, whenever she liked was a matter for complacent reflection, but otherwise she was very contented with things as they were. Sandie was hardly so satisfied. If not exactly an ardent lover, he had assuredly proved himself a very faithful one, and he ruled his life largely by the somewhat strict conceptions of Robina. Montagu was very tired. He had had a hard fortnight, with many broken, anxious nights. The responsibility had lain heavily on his young, slender shoulders. He was supremely thankful that Mr. Wycherly would be home on the morrow. It was pleasant to lie once more in his big four-post bed instead of in the somewhat cramped and stuffy cupboard where he had spent his nights lately. He stretched himself luxuriously, and turned and turned that he might find the absolutely comfortable position in which to fall asleep. But somehow sleep would not come. Every smallest sound disturbed him. Whenever a little piece of cinder fell into the grate from the fire in his aunt’s bedroom, he started up to listen, thinking she had moved and might want him. But all was perfectly quiet. Edmund, who preserved his infantile capacity for falling asleep directly he lay down, slumbered peacefully in the little bed beside the big one. Miss Esperance slept the heavy, dreamless sleep of old age and exhaustion. Mause, old now and very deaf, slept soundly in her kennel outside the little house, and Robina already slept the healthy sleep of hard-working youth. Only the little boy in the big bed with carved oaken posts and brocade canopy lay wide-eyed and wakeful with that dreadful, useless wakefulness that comes sometimes to the overtired. There was no moon to shine companionably through the blind, the room was in absolute, black darkness, and when Montagu had been in bed about half an hour it seemed to him that it must be the middle of the night. The casement window was wide open, but the night was so still that the blind never stirred. Again and again he sat up to listen for some sound from his aunt’s room; it would have been a relief had she wanted him, but there was no sound of any kind. Still he could not sleep, and at last his listening was rewarded, for he heard a step outside—a stealthy step that paused hesitating, then crept fumblingly forward. There was no doubt whatever that it was a step; and Montagu, convinced that it must at least be midnight, immediately jumped to the conclusion that whoever was there could be there for no lawful purpose. If it was a burglar, he must be got away without noise. That was Montagu’s first thought. On no account must Miss Esperance be wakened or alarmed.