“I have brought a guest, Aunt Ray,” Halsey said.  “I want you to adopt him into your affections and your Saturday-to-Monday list.  Let me present John Bailey, only you must call him Jack.  In twelve hours he’ll be calling you `Aunt’:  I know him.”

We shook hands, and I got a chance to look at Mr. Bailey; he was a tall fellow, perhaps thirty, and he wore a small mustache.  I remember wondering why:  he seemed to have a good mouth and when he smiled his teeth were above the average.  One never knows why certain men cling to a messy upper lip that must get into things, any more than one understands some women building up their hair on wire atrocities.  Otherwise, he was very good to look at, stalwart and tanned, with the direct gaze that I like.  I am particular about Mr. Bailey, because he was a prominent figure in what happened later.

Gertrude was tired with the trip and went up to bed very soon.  I made up my mind to tell them nothing; until the next day, and then to make as light of our excitement as possible.  After all, what had I to tell?  An inquisitive face peering in at a window; a crash in the night; a scratch or two on the stairs, and half a cuff-button!  As for Thomas and his forebodings, it was always my belief that a negro is one part thief, one part pigment, and the rest superstition.

It was Saturday night.  The two men went to the billiard-room, and I could hear them talking as I went up-stairs.  It seemed that Halsey had stopped at the Greenwood Club for gasolene and found Jack Bailey there, with the Sunday golf crowd.  Mr. Bailey had not been hard to persuade—­probably Gertrude knew why—­and they had carried him off triumphantly.  I roused Liddy to get them something to eat—­Thomas was beyond reach in the lodge—­and paid no attention to her evident terror of the kitchen regions.  Then I went to bed.  The men were still in the billiard-room when I finally dozed off, and the last thing I remember was the howl of a dog in front of the house.  It wailed a crescendo of woe that trailed off hopefully, only to break out afresh from a new point of the compass.

At three o’clock in the morning I was roused by a revolver shot.  The sound seemed to come from just outside my door.  For a moment I could not move.  Then—­I heard Gertrude stirring in her room, and the next moment she had thrown open the connecting door.

“O Aunt Ray!  Aunt Ray!” she cried hysterically.  “Some one has been killed, killed!”

“Thieves,” I said shortly.  “Thank goodness, there are some men in the house to-night.”  I was getting into my slippers and a bath-robe, and Gertrude with shaking hands was lighting a lamp.  Then we opened the door into the hall, where, crowded on the upper landing of the stairs, the maids, white-faced and trembling, were peering down, headed by Liddy.  I was greeted by a series of low screams and questions, and I tried to quiet them.

Gertrude had dropped on a chair and sat there limp and shivering.