"Why are you here?" she said.

Still no answer. The figure glided onward, and its eyes--glittering and baleful--were never once removed from Enid's face. With one supreme effort, the girl sprang from the bed and threw herself in the strange visitor's way. The figure halted and drew back. Enid laid a hand upon its arm. Ah, yes, thank Heaven, she felt the touch of flesh and blood!

No weird reflected image of a wandering brain was before her; a woman--only a wicked desperate woman--stood in her way. Enid was not afraid.

"Florence," she said, "why are you here?"

The woman dashed down the detaining hand. She knew that it was of no use to assume any longer the character with which she had hoped to impress the mind of the sensitive, nervous, delicate girl. She was no ghost indeed; she could figure no longer as a nightmare in Enid's memory. She stood revealed. But she did not lose her self possession. After a moment's pause, she spoke with dignity.

"I came here," she said, "to see whether you were sleeping quietly.

Surely I may do so much for my husband's niece?"

"And what were you doing there?" said Enid, pointing to the mantelpiece.

"Why were you tampering with what Mr. Ingledew sends me to take?"

"Tampering, you silly girl? You do not know the meaning of your own words!"

"Do I not? What have you in your hand?"

She grasped at the little phial which Flossy had half hidden in the white folds of her dressing-gown--grasped at it, and succeeded, by the quickness of her movement, in wrenching it from Mrs. Vane's hand. Then, even by the dim light of the candle, she could see that Flossy's color waned, and that her narrow eyes were distended with sudden fear.

"Why do you take that? Give it me back!"

"Yes," said Enid, upon whom the excitement had acted like a draught of wine, giving color to her face and decision to her tones--"yes, when I have found out what it contains."

"You little fool--you will not know when you look at it!"

"I will keep it and ask Mr. Ingledew or Mr. Evandale. You were pouring from it into the medicine that Mr. Ingledew gave me--for what purpose you know, not I."

A gasp issued from Flossy's pale lips. Her danger was clear to her now.

"Give it back to me!" she said. "I will have it--I tell you I will!"

Enid's hand was frail and slight; not for one moment could she have resisted Mrs. Vane's superior strength--for Flossy could be strong when occasion called for strength--and she did not try. With a quick sweep of her arm she hurled the little bottle into the grate! It broke into fragments as it fell, the crash striking painfully on the ear in the stillness of the night. The two women looked into each other's faces; and then Flossy quailed and fell back a step or two.

"What good or harm will that do?" she asked slowly. "Why did you break it?"

"Better for it to be broken than used for others' harm."

"How do you know that it was meant to do harm?"

"I don't know it; I feel it--I am sure of it. If you lie and cheat and rob, where will you stop short? Is it likely that I of all people can trust you?"

Florence caught at the bed as if for support. She was trembling violently; but her face had all its old malignancy as she said--

"You are going to slander me to your uncle, I suppose? Every one knows that you would gain if I--I and little Dick were out of the way!"

Enid looked at her steadily.

"You are very clever, Florence," she said, "and it is exceedingly clever of you to mention little Dick to me. You know that I love him, although I do not love you. I shall do no harm to him that I can help. But this--this burden is more than I can bear alone! I shall go to another for help."

"You have promised to speak to nobody but Hubert on the subject," said Flossy, turning upon her with a look of tigress-like fury.

"To nobody but my husband or my promised husband."

"And that is Hubert."

"No; it is not Hubert."

"Not Hubert? Then who--who?"

"That is nothing to you. You will hear in good time. You have no right to question me; you lost your authority over me long ago."

"Not Hubert?" Flossy repeated once more, as if bewildered by the news.

Then she burst into a low wild laugh. "You are right," she said. "He has replaced you already; he is desperately in love with Cynthia Westwood, the daughter of the man who murdered your father, and he has given you up. He never cared for you; he wanted your money only. Did that never occur to your innocent mind? As soon as he is better, he will make Cynthia his wife."

"He is free to do so if he pleases," said the girl, with a touch of scorn in her voice. "I am thankful to escape from you both. You will not expect me to live under the same roof with you again."

"Go where you please," returned Florence, "say and do what you please; I shall be only too glad to think that I shall never see your face again.

I always hated you, Enid Vane; from the time that you were a child I hated you, as I hated your mother before you. Some day you will perhaps know why."

"I don't want to know. I have always felt that you hated me," said Enid, the hot color receding from her cheeks. She was one of those people on whom the consciousness of being disliked produces a chilling effect.

"But I never hated you; I do not hate you now. Oh, Flossy, is there no way of setting things straight without letting anybody know?"

Florence sneered at the almost child-like appeal.

"For myself," she said, "I have a resource which will not fail me even if you do your worst. Do you think that I would ever live to bear public disgrace? Not for twenty-four hours! Remember this, Enid Vane--the day when the whole story, as we know it, comes to light will be my last. If you betray me, you will be my murderess. You will have killed me as truly as ever--as ever a cruel assassin killed your father Sydney Vane!"

With a gesture of her arm, as if to keep the girl from touching her, she swept towards the open door. Enid did not attempt to stop her. A sensation of awe, of affright even, seized her as she watched the white figure gliding steadily along the passage until the darkness hid it from her view. Then she sank down on the bed once more, trembling and afraid.

The desperate boldness which had for a long time possessed her was succeeded by a reaction of horror and dismay. How could she hide herself from Flossy's hate--how save herself from Flossy's sure revenge?

As she thought of these things, she knew by certain well-marked symptoms that one of her old attacks of almost cataleptic stupor was coming upon her. In the old days she would have succumbed to it at once. But Evandale's words rang in her ears. What had he said? He thought that she might control herself--that she might prevent these nervous seizures from overcoming her. She sat up, and by a violent effort roused herself a little. Then she tried the experiment of walking across the room to the open window, where the fresh air revived her. A glass of water, a few turns across the room, and, quite suddenly, she was once more mistress of herself. She had conquered the feeling of faintness--conquered the terrible rigidity of limb which used to attack her at these times. The Rector's words had proved the tonic that her weakened nerves seemed to require. For the first time in her life she was a conqueror. There was no reason why she should not conquer again and again until her nerves recovered their tone and the fatal tendency was overcome.

New strength came to her with this consciousness. She lighted a lamp and donned a dressing-gown; then, after a little deliberation, she went to Parker's room. She found the maid up and partially dressed. There was a scared look on the woman's face which caused Enid to suspect that her conversation with Mrs. Vane had been partially if not altogether overheard. But this Enid resolved not to seem to know.

"Parker," she said quietly, "I am thinking of going to London. Will you come with me?"

"Yes, miss, that I will--to the end of the world if you like!" was the unexpectedly fervent response.

But Enid showed no surprise.

"Can you tell me about the trains? What is the earliest?"

"There's one at six, miss; but you wouldn't start so early as that, would you?"

"The sooner the better, I think. I will dress now, and call you presently to pack my bag. The boxes can be sent afterwards."

"Yes, miss."

"And, Parker, if you come with me, you must remember that you are quitting Mrs. Vane's service. She will never take you back if you leave her now."