Since four doors opened upon each of the landings, at all costs,
I thought, I must learn by which door she entered.

Throwing caution to the winds I raced up the remaining flights . . .
and there at the top the woman confronted me, with blazing eyes!--
with eyes that thrilled every nerve; for they were violet eyes, the
only truly violet eyes I have ever seen! They were the eyes of the
woman who like a charming, mocking will-o'-the-wisp had danced
through this tragic scene from the time that poor Professor Deeping
had brought the Prophet's slipper to London up to this present hour!

There at the head of those stone steps in that common dwelling-house
I knew her--and in the violet eyes it was written that she knew,
and feared, me!

"What do you want? Why are you following me?"

She made no endeavour to disguise her voice. Almost, I think, she
spoke the words involuntarily.

I stood beside her. Quickly as she had turned from the door at my
ascent, I had noted that it was that numbered forty-eight which she
had been about to open.

"You waste words," I said grimly. "Who lives there?"

I nodded in the direction of the doorway. The violet eyes watched
me with an expression in their depths which I find myself wholly
unable to describe. Fear predominated, but there was anger, too,
and with it a sort of entreaty which almost made me regret that I