At last he was speaking in good earnest: he laid a strong emphasis on his closing words. I laid a stronger emphasis on them still by suddenly leaving my chair. The impulse to spring to my feet was irresistible. Major Fitz-David had started a new idea in my mind. “Now we understand each other!” I said. “I will accept your own terms, Major. I will ask nothing of you but what you have just offered to me of your own accord.” “What have I offered?” he inquired, looking a little alarmed. “Nothing that you need repent of,” I answered; “nothing which is not easy for you to grant. May I ask a bold question? Suppose this house was mine instead of yours?” “Consider it yours,” cried the gallant old gentleman. “From the garret to the kitchen, consider it yours!” “A thousand thanks, Major; I will consider it mine for the moment. You know--everybody knows--that one of a woman’s many weaknesses is curiosity. Suppose my curiosity led me to examine everything in my new house?” “Yes?” “Suppose I went from room to room, and searched everything, and peeped in everywhere? Do you think there would be any chance--” The quick-witted Major anticipated the nature of my question. He followed my example; he too started to his feet, with a new idea in his mind. “Would there be any chance,” I went on, “of my finding my own way to my husband’s secret in this house? One word of reply, Major Fitz-David! Only one word--Yes or No?” “Don’t excite yourself!” cried the Major. “Yes or No?” I repeated, more vehemently than ever. “Yes,” said the Major, after a moment’s consideration. It was the reply I had asked for; but it was not explicit enough, now I had got it, to satisfy me. I felt the necessity of leading him (if possible) into details. “Does ‘Yes’ mean that there is some sort of clew to the mystery?” I asked. “Something, for instance, which my eyes might see and my hands might touch if I could only find it?” He considered again. I saw that I had succeeded in interesting him in some way unknown to myself; and I waited patiently until he was prepared to answer me. “The thing you mention,” he said, “the clew (as you call it), might be seen and might be touched--supposing you could find it.” “In this house?” I asked. The Major advanced a step nearer to me, and answered-- “In this room.” My head began to swim; my heart throbbed violently. I tried to speak; it was in vain; the effort almost choked me. In the silence I could hear the music-lesson still going on in the room above. The future prima donna had done practicing her scales, and was trying her voice now in selections from Italian operas. At the moment when I first heard her she was singing the beautiful air from the _Somnambula,_ “Come per me sereno.” I never hear that delicious melody, to this day, without being instantly transported in imagination to the fatal back-room in Vivian Place. The Major--strongly affected himself by this time--was the first to break the silence.