Elsie was in the act of lifting her muff to her face—it was not much of a protection, but she had seized upon it when she heard the front door bang. She felt that it was the bang of a discovered crime. It took Elsie a long time to say “Nothing—” but at last she said it; and then she looked all round the room for a way of escape, but there was none. It would be difficult to say which of the two criminals Onoria was angriest with. She had been angry with Peter Gubbins all her life—for being Peter Gubbins; his character irritated and at times eluded Onoria. Elsie she loved; probably she was angriest with Elsie. “Please don’t tell me lies,” she exclaimed with deadly patience. “I heard perfectly well what you were doing, as I came up the road. I could no more mistake Peter’s voice than a donkey braying. It came from my room—and _you—you_, Elsie, were playing his accompaniments!” Elsie bit a piece of fur out of her muff in anguish. The situation was too large for her. She cowered under it, speechless and overwhelmed. But something at the bottom of her heart told her it was not fair and she would not be overwhelmed. “What do you mean by such atrocious behaviour?” went on Onoria with fluent passion. “Using my house, behind my back, to do what you _know_ I have forbidden? How _dared_ you do such a thing, Elsie? How can you come here now and look me in the face with that treacherous secret upon you?” Elsie made a gesture of despair: she put the muff down; it had protected her from nothing. It was a late autumn evening, a river fog had crept into the room, everything was a little indistinct, like a scene in a nightmare; only the bitter, sharp voice of Onoria pelting at her was as distinct as a succession of stones flung against a wall. “Oh,” she gasped, “I didn’t mean—we didn’t think!” “Mean! think!” cried Onoria. “What have you ever thought or meant, either of you? How can I tell now? How can I believe you? Don’t you see what you’ve done? You’ve undermined my confidence! How many times have you played here without my knowledge? I don’t believe this is the first!” “He did like singing the Scotch ballads so,” Elsie murmured defensively. “It was an accident the first time. We just tried them over: it didn’t seem any harm. He had come in to dust your books for you and I was early, so we just tried them over.” Onoria changed her ground. She felt for a moment as if it was not so firm as she had expected. The crime did not stand out well against the background of Peter’s services.