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saw.”
    “Mortgages?” I asked, wondering that she should require more money than her income, even with the repairs to a barn deducted from it.
    “Mortgages, selling pictures or jewelry or what not—he has his say about everything, making it impossible for me to raise ... But it is only a nuisance. Not serious,” she added, without much conviction.
    I took the impulsive decision it was possible to ask her point-blank after all, and did so. “What in the world would you need more than ten thousand pounds a year for, Auntie?”
    She looked around the room, hunching her shoulders, making poofing sounds with her mouth, undecided whether to tell me to mind my own business or to ignore the question. “Occasionally, for an extraordinary expense .... ” she said at last.
    “What extraordinary expense?”
    “The barn, as I mentioned. Helping people. Charity work. Things like that.”
    “Helping Pierre?” I essayed.
    “Pierre?” She laughed out loud at the thought. Laughed so hard I took the idea she was trying to hide something. I did not get anything else out of her. I knew she was in some financial trouble but would have to discover its cause in some other manner. I hoped for enlightenment from Dr. Hill.
    A few moments later I asked her where he lived. It was not more than a mile and a half down the road, in a pretty rose-covered Elizabethan cottage, which should not be difficult to find. He was coming to dinner that same day, but if no privacy was found, I could go to him.
    Before long, our talk turned back to Gloria. I explained that I did not think it possible for Nancy to vault over a building, no matter what incentive she had. “She is being pursued by the villain, and the tollgate keeper is his accomplice. She only realizes it as she approaches the booth, and hasn’t time to stop.”
    “She could go around it.”
    “Oh, no, there is a river on one side, and an armed man on the other, prepared to capture her. It is over the top, or she is done for. I am convinced it can be done. Oh, and there is something else, Valerie. You must not tell Mr. Sinclair why you are here. I would not want him running back to St. Regis with the story I am writing books. He would dislike it very much.”
    “It is none of their business, but if you want it kept mum, it is no difference to me. How about Pierre? He is on close terms with Sinclair. Will he not tell?”
    “He doesn’t know, my dear. I even told him once, but he does not understand a great deal of what he hears. He thinks I lock myself up mornings to write letters. So I would too, if the alternative were listening to him trying to talk to me. I like Pierre immensely, so charming and generous, but wearing. There is no denying he is hard on the nerves. Now, what would you like to do this afternoon, Valerie?”
    “Go to see the oubliette, and explore the secret passage you spoke of.”
    “I shall go down to the dungeon with you. There might be something in it for Gloria . .. ” Her voice trailed off, while she looked with unseeing eyes out the window, caught up once more in the tenebrous shadows.
    The oubliette was a disappointment. There was clammy, cold stone, as promised, with a few puddles on the floor. There were three sets of clamps and chains hanging from the wall. There was no light whatsoever, save for the lamps we carried with us. A cloud of cobwebs stroked my cheek at one point, giving me a nice shiver down the spine, and I heard a dainty scuffle in a black corner that was very likely a mouse or a rat.
    With all this marvelous stuff, you will think I am hard to please. What was lacking was the element of danger. It was impossible to raise a goose bump when we had two footmen with us, and Aunt Louise would insist on talking in the most matter-of-fact way to them about cleaning the glass of their lamps, for it was smudged, and of having them come down to give the dungeon floor a good sweeping. She is peculiarly unimaginative for a lady who deals in gothic