He made the last statement in a tone of regret.
“Then you know almost nothing about my aunt?” continued the self-possessed young lady.
“Only her name and address,” he admitted. He was wondering if Mrs. Sappleton was in the married or widowed state. Something in the room suggested man's habitation.
“Her great tragedy happened just three years ago,” said the child.
“Her tragedy?” asked Framton.
“You may wonder why we keep that window open on an October afternoon,” said the niece, pointing at a large French window.
“It is quite warm for the time of the year,” said Framton; “but is that window connected with the tragedy?”
“Out through that window, three years ago, her husband and her two young brothers went off for their shooting. They never came back. When they were walking to their favorite shooting place they sank in a treacherous bog. It was a very wet summer, you know, and places that were safe in other years became deadly without warning. Their bodies were never found.” Here the child's voice lost its self-possessed tone and became human. “Poor aunt always thinks that they will come back someday, they and the little brown spaniel that was lost with them, and walk in at that window just as they used to do. That is why the window is open every evening till it is quite dark. Poor aunt, she often told me how they went out, her husband with his white waterproof coat over his arm, and Ronnie, her youngest brother, singing 'Bertie, why do you bound?' as he always did to tease her. Do you know, sometimes on quiet evenings like this, I almost get a creepy feeling that they will all walk in through that window…”
She shivered. It was a relief to Framton when the aunt went down into the room with of apologies for being late.
“I hope Vera was friendly?” she said.
“She was very interesting,” said Framton.
“I hope you don't mind the open window,” said Mrs. Sappleton; “my husband and brothers will be home from shooting, and they always come in this way.”
She spoke cheerfully about the shooting and the birds. To Framton it was all purely horrible.
He made an effort to turn the talk on to a less ghastly topic but he saw that the woman was giving him only a part of her attention, and her eyes were looking at the open window. It was certainly an unfortunate coincidence that he should have paid his visit on this tragic anniversary.
“The doctors agree in ordering me complete rest, no excitement, and no physical exercise,” said Framton, who thought that total strangers were interested in the details of one's illnesses. “On the matter of diet they are not in agreement,” he continued.
“No?” said Mrs. Sappleton, in a voice which only replaced a yawn at the last moment. Then she suddenly brightened into alert attention – but not to what Framton was saying.
“Here they are!” she cried. “Just in time for tea, and they look as if they were dirty up to the eyes!”
Framton shivered a little and turned towards the niece with a look expressing sympathetic understanding. But the child was looking through the open window with a horror in her eyes. In a shock of nameless fear Framton looked in the same direction.
In the twilight three figures were walking across the yard towards the window, they all carried guns in their arms, and one of them had a white coat over his shoulders. A tired brown spaniel kept close at their heels. Noiselessly they neared the house, and then a young voice sang out of the dusk: “I said, Bertie, why do you bound?”
