Page:Lady Barbarity; a romance (IA ladybarbarityrom00snai).pdf/134

 must I repay the trust reposed in me by betraying him to his foes? It appeared that my vaunted heartlessness had deserted me when needed most. I was involved in this hard problem, and casting contumely on Mrs. Polly because she could not suggest any kind of solution to it, when a knock upon the door disturbed our council. Emblem rose, unlocked the door, and admitted little Pettigrew, the page. He was the spy who had been posted on the stairs, also at the keyhole of the library door at favourable intervals. The information that he brought completely terrified us both.

I dismissed him as soon as it was given, for it was not wise that he should glean too much.

"Emblem," says I, on Pettigrew's departure, "that settles it. That leaves absolutely nothing to be done. I wish that Captain was at the bottom of the sea!"

For the result of the interview between the Captain and the Earl was this: the house was about to be searched from the bottom to the top, and every room and cupboard was to be overhauled, since the Captain, having taken the evidence of his men, and having heard strange sounds in the night himself, had put two and two together and was now heavily suspecting me. My papa was not loth to do so either, and at the suggestion of the soldier, had issued strict instructions that no person under any pretext whatever was to leave the house until a thorough examination had been made.