"Yes!" whispered the young man replying to the unspoken thought, "at half past five o'clock!" Herrick shuddered again and drew the sheet over the dead face. Then he took Stephen by the arm and led him downstairs into the study. There he left him in a chair and went into the dining-room, whence he returned with a decanter and two glasses. Pouring out two stiff glasses of brandy he forced Stephen to drink one, and took the other himself. Both were in need of the stimulant, for the event had shaken them considerably. By and bye Marsh laid down his head on the table and wept quietly. He had been devoted to the dead woman and was all unstrung. Moreover the uncanny way in which the first announcement of the death had been made, shocked him deeply. Herrick went out to see Petronella. He found her in the death chamber. A genuine Romanist, she had placed candles round the bed, and a crucifix on the breast of the dead, On her knees she was praying aloud. Seeing that all had been done that could be done, Herrick returned to the study. Stephen was calmer, and inclined to talk. "It was half past five as Sidney said," he said in a low voice. "Oh, Herrick what does it mean?" "I do not know," said the usually sceptically doctor, "After you had gone, I asked the boy how he knew. He said that while asleep he had dreamed--so he put it--that he was standing in your mother's bedroom. She was dying in a stupor, and he saw the breath gradually leave her body. He also said that he saw her spirit after she was dead. But of course that must be nonsense." "After what he said I can believe anything" said Marsh, "what else?" "Well," said Jim uncomfortably, "he described the bedroom exactly. Was he ever in it Stephen?" "No; certainly not. And he described it?" "Exactly; and as being in the state in which it now is. He said that Petronella came in at the door with a tray and placed it beside the bed. She then put her hand on your mother's heart and found that she was dead. Afterwards she opened the window. Why--what--Stephen?" "My God!" cried the young man now ghastly white. "That is exactly what Petronella told me she did. Oh, oh!" and he fainted. Herrick scarcely wondered at it; he felt deadly sick himself and it needed another glass of brandy before he could recover himself sufficiently to attend to the unconscious man.