“The secret?  Between Rachel and me?”

“Aye!  Ye both know what’s happened to them notes, and ye’ve made it up between ye to say nowt!”

Mrs. Maldon answered gravely—­

“You are quite mistaken.  I know nothing, and I’m sure Rachel doesn’t.  And we have made nothing up between us.  How can you imagine such things?”

“Why don’t ye have the police told?”

“I cannot do with the police in my house.”

Mr. Batchgrew approached the bed almost threateningly.

“I’ll tell you why ye won’t have the police told.  Because ye know Louis Fores has taken your money.  It’s as plain as a pikestaff.  Ye put it on the chair on the landing here, and ye left it there, and he came along and pocketed it.”  Mrs. Maldon essayed to protest, but he cut her short.  “Did he or did he not come upstairs after ye’d been upstairs yourself?”

As Mrs. Maldon hesitated, Thomas Batchgrew began to feel younger and more impressive.

“Yes, he did,” said Mrs. Maldon at length.  “But only because I asked him to come up—­to fasten the window.”

“What window?”

“The landing window.”

Mr. Batchgrew, startled and delighted by this unexpected confirmation of his theory, exploded—­

“Ha!...  And how soon was that after ye’d been upstairs with the notes?”

“It was just afterwards.”

“Ha!...  I don’t mind telling ye I’ve been suspecting that young man ever since this morning.  I only learnt just now as he was in th’ house all night.  That made me think for a moment as he’d done it after ye’d all gone to bed.  And for aught I know he may have.  But done it some time he has, and you know it as well as I do, Elizabeth.”

Mrs. Maldon maintained her serenity.

“We may be unjust to him.  I should never forgive myself if I was.  He has a very good side to him, has Louis!”

“I’ve never seen it,” said Mr. Batchgrew, still growing in authority.  “He began as a thief and he’ll end as a thief, if it’s no worse.”

“Began as a thief?” Mrs. Maldon protested.

“Well, what d’ye suppose he left the bank for?”

“I never knew quite why he left the bank.  I always understood there was some unpleasantness.”

“If ye didn’t know, it was because ye didn’t want to know.  Ye never do want to know these things.  ‘Unpleasantness!’ There’s only one sort of unpleasantness with the clerks in a bank!... I know, anyhow, because I took the trouble to find out for myself, when I had that bother with him in my own office.  And a nice affair that was, too!”

“But you told me at the time that his books were all right with you.  Only you preferred not to keep him.”  Mrs. Maiden’s voice was now plaintive.

Thomas Batchgrew came close to the bed and leaned on the foot of it.

“There’s some things as you won’t hear, Elizabeth.  His books were all right, but he’d made ’em all right.  I got hold of him afore he’d done more than he could undo—­that’s all.  There’s one trifle as I might ha’ told ye if ye hadn’t such a way of shutting folks up sometimes, missis.  I’ll tell ye now.  Louis Fores went down on his knees to me in my office.  On his knees, and all blubbing.  What about that?”