‘Now from what we know, and from what happened to me on the first night I ever spent in this house,’ said Maurice, ‘it is clear to my mind that your granddaughter and her husband were in the habit of meeting secretly in the room at the end of the corridor at night, when every one else in the house was asleep.’
He went on to describe his first night at Borcel End; Muriel watching at the open window, entreating her lover to come back to her. Did not this conduct indicate that Captain Penwyn had been in the habit of entering the house secretly by that window? Its height was little over eight feet from the ground, and the ivy-clad wall would have been easy enough for any active young man to climb, to say nothing of the ledge and projecting masonry of the low window, which made the ascent still easier.
‘My idea is this,’ said Maurice. ‘Your poor granddaughter’s instinct takes her to that room whenever she is free to ramble about the house at night when all is still, and she has no fear of interruption. For her that room is haunted by sad and sweet memories. What more likely than that if free to go there nightly she would, in the self-communion of a wandering mind, reveal more of the past than we have yet learned, act over again her meetings with her lover, say over again the old words? Will you leave her free to wander to-night, if the fancy seizes her? I will lie down in my clothes, and keep watch, ready to listen, or to follow her if need be. The moon is nearly at the full, and the night will be bright enough to tempt her to wander. Will you let it be so, Mrs. Trevanard?’
‘I don’t see that any harm could come of it,’ answered the old woman, dubiously. ‘She is reasonable enough in her way, and I have never known her attempt to do herself a mischief. But as to what she can reveal in her wild wandering talk, I don’t see myself how that can be of any good.’
‘Perhaps not. It is only a fancy of mine at best, but I shall be pleased if you will indulge it. I shall not be here more than two or three nights.’
‘I will leave my door unlocked on those nights,’ said Mrs. Trevanard. ‘But I shall not have much rest while that poor child is wandering about.’
To the grandmother, to whom the past was more real than the present, Muriel was still the girl of eighteen newly returned from school.