The days moved with leaden feet for Penelope Noelson. She had come to know every inch of space in the walled garden, and although she gazed wistfully through the iron bars of the gate again and again, no one ever came in sight. Always she felt that certain, if unobtrusive, surveillance over her every movement. The care with which she was watched was brought home to her when she took to dropping notes over the wall in the hope that they would be picked up by some stray wayfarer. Within half an hour they had been returned to her by Sophie Lengholm, with a veiled hint that she might be kept locked in her room if she persisted in trying to communicate with the outside world. At night the great Alsatian wolf-hound, of which she had caught a glimpse on the day of her arrival, patrolled the grounds. Not that that made any difference, for she knew that a key was turned in her lock every evening, although she did not know that Sophie Lengholm for reasons of her own, held the key. Apart from these restrictions she had little to complain of but her loss of liberty. She saw strange men about the place on occasion and knew they had long interviews with Larry Hughes, but they never interfered with her. The servants were always courteous, but firmly reticent when she attempted to pump them. Larry Hughes himself treated her with punctilious politeness on the whole, although there were passages in which the mask was lifted and she clashed with his savage and indomitable will. These episodes usually followed a repulsed attempt on his part to make love to her, and she had learned to meet them with a dignified retirement to her room. She tried to meet her situation gracefully, but there were moments when horror had her by the throat. She was sickened by her own impotence to meet the march of an unknown destiny. Were the police seeking her as a fugitive thief? What was at the back of Larry Hughes' mind in regard to her? One thing was certain. She could not be held indefinitely as a prisoner in this spot. She contemplated the future with dizzy apprehension. There came a day when no man moved about the house or grounds. Sophie Lengholm met her inquiries with the grim assurance that they would be back in a little. Penelope knew that she lied. She twisted her brains for some method of using the situation to her advantage. It was a case of woman to woman only. They were alone together, save only for the big Alsatian.