Again and again Sir Oswald consulted the anonymous letter. It told him
to wait, but for what was he to wait? Half ashamed of himself for
having yielded to the tempter, restless and uneasy in spirit, he
wandered from room to room in the twilight, abandoned to gloomy and
miserable thoughts.
The servants lighted the lamps in the many chambers of Raynham, while
Sir Oswald paced to and fro--now in the long drawing-room; now in the
library; now on the terrace, where the September moon shone broad and
full. It was eleven o'clock when the sound of approaching wheels
proclaimed the return of the picnic party; and until that hour the
baronet had watched and waited without having been rewarded by the
smallest discovery of any kind whatever. He felt bitterly ashamed of
himself for having been duped by so shallow a trick.
"It is the handiwork of some kind friend; the practical joke of some
flippant youngster, who thinks it a delightful piece of humour to play
upon the jealousy of a husband of fifty," mused the baronet, as he
brooded over his folly. "I wish to heaven I could discover the writer
of the epistle. He should find that it is rather a dangerous thing to
trifle with a man's feelings."
Sir Oswald went himself to assist at the reception of his guests. He
expected to see his wife arrive with the rest. For the moment, he
forgot all about his suspicions of the last fortnight.
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