“Ah, Mr. Lester,” she said, “you are prompt.  You have the money?” she added in a lower tone.

“Yes,” I answered, and then stopped, for I fancied I heard a stealthy footstep at the door.

“Let us go up to the study.  We will be more comfortable there,” and she led the way out into the hall.

I was close at her heels, and looked quickly to right and left.  But there was no one in sight.

Mrs. Magnus went before me up the stair, turned toward the front of the house in the hall above, and ushered me into a small room which seemed to have been fitted up as an office.  Its principal piece of furniture was a massive, roll-top desk.  The top was up at the moment, and disclosed rows of pigeon-holes, some full of papers and some empty.  Below them were the usual small drawers.  The desk was one of the largest I have ever seen, and I wondered how it had been got into the room.  An office chair of the usual swing type stood in front of it.

Something told me that this was the desk.  It stood in one corner of the room; not closely in the corner, but at an angle to it, its back touching the wall on either side and leaving a little triangle of space behind it.  The reason of this was evident enough, for, placed in this way, the person sitting at the desk got the advantage of the light from the window at his right, and also the heat from the fireplace at his left.

The thought flashed through my mind that, before I placed the money on the desk, I would take occasion to glance over into the space back of it.

“Sit down, Mr. Lester,” said Mrs. Magnus, and herself drew up a chair to one side of the fireplace, where a wood fire crackled cheerily, throwing out a warmth just strong enough to be grateful on this damp evening.  “The money is in that bag?”

“Yes,” I said.  “I have it in hundred-dollar bills—­five packets of one hundred each.  I thought perhaps you—­your husband would prefer it in that form.”

She nodded, and sat for a moment staring absently into the fire.

“This was Mr. Magnus’ workroom, I suppose?” I said at last.

“Yes; when he was first really succeeding in business, he used always to bring some work home with him in the evening.  But he outgrew that”—­a shade of bitterness crept into her voice—­“and during the last ten years of his life he used the room hardly at all.  But he is using it again now,” she added, in another tone.  “Every night.”

I stared across at her, wondering if she could be in earnest.  Certainly her countenance gave every impression of earnestness.

“He will be here to-night,” she went on.  “It is a little early yet.  He usually comes at eight-thirty.”

“You mean he is here in the spirit,” I said, trying to speak lightly.

“In the spirit, of course.”

I breathed a sigh of relief.  I fancied that I began to understand.

“Many people believe that their dead watch over them,” I said.