So Captain Grey took Lexy’s arm, and they did make a run for it, through the fine, chilly rain, along a garden path and up on a veranda. The door was opened at once. “Miss Royce?” asked Captain Grey. “Mrs. Royce,” said the other. “Come right in. My, how it does rain!” They followed her into a dimly lit hall. She opened a door on the right, and lit the gas in what was obviously the “best parlor”—a dreadful room, stiff and ugly, and smelling of camphor and dampness. Captain Grey remained in the hall to settle with the driver, and Lexy decided to let her share of the reckoning wait for a more auspicious occasion. She went into the parlor with Mrs. Royce. “You and your husband just come from the city?” inquired the landlady. “He’s not my husband,” replied Lexy, with a laugh. “I never set eyes on him before. There was only one taxi, and we were both looking for a hotel. The driver said you took boarders, and that’s how we happened to come together.” “I don’t take boarders much, ’cept in the summer time,” said Mrs. Royce. She was a stout, comfortable sort of creature, gray-haired, and very neat in her dark dress and clean white apron. She had a kindly, good-humored face, too, but she had a landlady’s eye. “People don’t come here much, this time of year,” she went on. “Nothing to bring ’em here.” These last words were a challenge to Lexy to explain her business, and she was prepared. “I passed through here the other day in a motor,” she said, “on my way to Adams Corners, and I thought it looked like such a nice, quiet place for me to work in. I’m a writer, you know, and I thought Wyngate would just suit me.” “I was born and raised out to Adams Corners,” said Mrs. Royce. “Guess there’s no one living out there that I don’t know.” “Then perhaps you know Miss Craigie?” “Miss Margaret Craigie? I should say I did! If you’re a friend of hers—” “Only an acquaintance,” said Lexy cautiously. “Set down!” suggested Mrs. Royce, very cordial now. “I’ll light a nice wood fire. A writer, are you? Well, well! And the gentleman—I wonder, now, what brings him here!” “He told me he’d come to see his sister,” said Lexy. “Mrs. Quelton, I think he said.” “Quelton!” cried the landlady. “You didn’t say Quelton? Not the doctor’s wife?” “Yes,” said the captain’s voice from the doorway. “Nothing happened to her, has there? Nothing gone wrong?” Mrs. Royce stared at him with the most profound interest, and he stared back at her, somewhat uneasily. “No,” said she, at last. “No—only—well, I’m sure!” There was a silence. “Could we possibly have a little supper?” asked Lexy politely. “Yes, indeed you can!” said Mrs. Royce. “Right away!” But still she lingered. “Mrs. Quelton’s brother!” she said. “Well, I never!” Then she tore herself away, leaving Lexy and Captain Grey alone in the parlor. “Seems to bother her,” he said. “I wonder why!” Lexy was also wondering, and longing to ask questions, but she felt that it wouldn’t be good manners.