Through the open door of one of the glass houses I saw old Stuart.  He was leaning against the staging, his hands in his pockets, and so deep in thought he gave no heed to me.

I hesitated and went on towards the cottage, slowly.

Something struck me as unusual about the place, but I could not tell at first what it was.  One of the bedroom windows was open, and the customary short blind, with its brass upper rail partly unfastened, drooped obliquely across the vacant space.  It looked negligent and odd, for usually everything about the cottage was conspicuously trim.

The door was standing wide open, and everything was still.  But giving that usually orderly hall an odd look—­it was about half-past two in the afternoon—­was a pile of three dirty plates, with used knives and forks upon them, on one of the hall chairs.

I went into the hall, looked into either room, and hesitated.

Then I fell to upon the door-knocker and gave a loud rat-tat-too, and followed this up with an amiable “Hel-lo!”

For a time no one answered me, and I stood listening and expectant, with my fingers about my weapon.  Some one moved about upstairs presently, and was still again.  The tension of waiting seemed to brace my nerves.

I had my hand on the knocker for the second time, when Puss appeared in the doorway.

For a moment we remained staring at one another without speaking.  Her hair was disheveled, her face dirty, tear-stained, and irregularly red.  Her expression at the sight of me was pure astonishment.  I thought she was about to say something, and then she had darted away out of the house again.

“I say, Puss!” I said.  “Puss!”

I followed her out of the door.  “Puss!  What’s the matter?  Where’s Nettie?”

She vanished round the corner of the house.

I hesitated, perplexed whether I should pursue her.  What did it all mean?  Then I heard some one upstairs.

“Willie!” cried the voice of Mrs. Stuart.  “Is that you?”

“Yes,” I answered.  “Where’s every one?  Where’s Nettie?  I want to have a talk with her.”

She did not answer, but I heard her dress rustle as she moved.  I Judged she was upon the landing overhead.

I paused at the foot of the stairs, expecting her to appear and come down.

Suddenly came a strange sound, a rush of sounds, words jumbled and hurrying, confused and shapeless, borne along upon a note of throaty distress that at last submerged the words altogether and ended in a wail.  Except that it came from a woman’s throat it was exactly the babbling sound of a weeping child with a grievance.  “I can’t,” she said, “I can’t,” and that was all I could distinguish.  It was to my young ears the strangest sound conceivable from a kindly motherly little woman, whom I had always thought of chiefly as an unparalleled maker of cakes.  It frightened me.  I went upstairs at once in a state of infinite alarm, and there she was upon the landing, leaning forward over the top of the chest of drawers beside her open bedroom door, and weeping.  I never saw such weeping.  One thick strand of black hair had escaped, and hung with a spiral twist down her back; never before had I noticed that she had gray hairs.