But would she win it? The fates were on Isabel's side. Nannie upstairs helpless in her bed; Cuthbert Grahame still more helpless in his; the two girls out--Margaret Wallace would have to reckon with her. Isabel overrated herself if, in such a contest as was likely to ensue, she did not prove the better of the pair.
A sudden thought occurring to her she hurried into the hall. By some fortunate chance the front door was closed, so that she remained unseen by the approaching visitor. She remembered that she had closed it when she herself had come in; as a rule it stood wide open. If it had been then it would have been impossible for her to perform the part she proposed to play. As soon as she reached it she turned the key--only just in time. Within thirty seconds the handle was tried by some one on the other side.
"That settles it," observed Isabel to herself. "I didn't look at the face in the miniature so closely as all that, it was the setting which occupied me. I might have mistaken the likeness, and it mightn't have been Margaret Wallace after all. But the style in which she turned that handle gives her away. She's come in and out of this house too often not to be aware that, even if the door does happen to be shut, you've only got to turn the handle to come in. When she found that it wouldn't open, I'll bet that she had a bit of a shock. Holloa! it seems that she can't believe it now. I daresay it's the first time in all her life that she's found that door closed against her."
Something of the kind did seem possible. The person on the other side was giving the handle various twists and turns, as if unable to credit that the door was actually locked. It was only after continued efforts that the fact was realised. There was an interval, as if the person without was considering the position.
"Now what'll she do?" wondered Isabel. "Go round to the back, and see if she can't get in that way? She won't think it a possible thing that both doors can be locked. The odds are that she's come in one way as often as the other. She won't come in that way this time, and so I'll show her."
On stealthy feet Isabel, stealing to the back of the house, both locked and bolted the door which gave ingress to the house on that side. As she was ramming the top bolt home a bell clanged through the house followed by the rat-tat-tat of a knocker.