The men brought their burden in, walking with the crunching sound made by rubber boots. They came behind the bar to the tap-room door and set the chest down, while one felt in his pocket for a key, and groping, found the lock. It seemed, in that strained silence, they must hear the thumping of her heart. They went in and left the chest and came out directly, closing and relocking the door. But as the key was withdrawn it fell with a muffled clink to the floor. She knew that it rested partly on the edge of her skirt but she dared not stir. She remained crouching, on her knees, another breathless interminable moment, then one said impatiently, "I’ve left my match-safe on board." She knew that quick, incautious voice, and yet she could not master her unreasoning terror. It was Philip, but Philip shrouded in mystery; and the Philip she had known, with all his faults, had been open, above concealment, clear as day. "Hush, you don’t want any matches here," the other answered softly, and he dropped to his knees, feeling the floor. "Never mind," he said, rising, "Smith has the duplicate. Come, we must get away." Louise waited, listening, until the tender pushed off, then she took the key and rose from her cramped position. She walked unsteadily around the bar and stopped, supporting herself on it for a moment. She was facing the dim square of light that marked the rear entrance, and she saw the mast of the little vessel rising tall and spectral through the gloom. Then presently her jib unfolded, her mainsail ran up, and she stood away and like a phantom dissolved in the smoke. Louise turned and walked to the front door and on down towards her gate. Her fingers locked and unlocked over the key. "It was Philip," she told herself. "He comes here to the mills, secretly, at night, where he is master, and puts something in hiding. And I—I dared not speak to him. I crept like a coward—out of sight. I had done nothing—wrong—and yet I was—afraid." Little Silas was waiting with Mason at the gate. She stopped in the light of the slab-fire to admire the fine lines of the finished boat. The old sailor stumped away radiant, and she went in with the child and lighted the swinging lamp and set the crimson shade. She drew the blinds and seated herself in the low wicker chair by the open fire to give the boy his hour. But afterwards, when he had been tucked snugly in his bed and she came back to the room, she took the key from her pocket and studied it, turning it slowly in her hands, as though she expected to find in it some difference from other keys; some clue to that mystery in the tap-room. There was a lurking dread in her eyes; lines settled at the corners of her sweet mouth. "The other man was Mr. Stratton," she said at last. "And some one else has the duplicate. Oh, I don’t understand. I don’t understand."