"You would be doing better to carry, or
rather transport, your mind back to what
followed and succeeded the young woman's
screech. What did we all do, sir? We
rushed to the spot, and we ran to the place.
And what did we all see, sir? We saw you,
ma'am, lying horizontally prostrate, on the
top of the landing of the first of the flight
of the north stairs; and we saw those keys
now hanging up yonder, abstracted, and
purloined,  and, as it were, snatched, from their
place in this room, and lying horizontally
prostrate likewise, on the floor of the hall.
There are the facts, the circumstances, the
events, laid, or rather placed, before you.
What have you got to say to them? Yes!
what have you got to say to them? I call
upon you both solemnly, and, I will add,
seriously!—in my own name, in the name of
Mrs. Pentreath, in the name of our employers,
in the name of decency, in the name of
wonder—what do you mean by it?"

With that fiery conclusion, Mr. Munder
struck his fist on the table, and waited with
a stare of merciless expectation, for anything
in the shape of an answer, an explanation, or
a defence which the culprits at the bottom
of the room might be disposed to offer.

"Tell him anything," whispered Sarah to
the old man. "Anything to keep him quiet;
anything to make him let us go! After
what I have suffered, these people will drive
me mad!"

Never very quick at inventing an excuse,
and perfectly ignorant besides of what had
really happened to his niece while she was
alone in the north hall, Uncle Joseph, with
the best will in the world to prove himself
equal to the emergency, felt considerable
difficulty in deciding what he should say or
do. Determined, however, at all hazards, to
spare Sarah any useless suffering, and to
remove her from the house as speedily as
possible, he rose to take the responsibility of
speaking on himself, looking hard, before he
opened his lips, at Mr. Munder, who
immediately leaned forward on the table, with his
hand to his ear. Uncle Joseph acknowledged
this polite act of attention with one of his
fantastic bows; and then replied to the whole
of the steward's long harangue, in these six
unanswerable words:—

"I wish you good day, sir!"

"How dare you wish me anything of the
sort!" cried Mr. Munder, jumping out of his
chair in violent indignation. "How dare you
trifle with a serious subject and a serious
question in that way? Wish me good day,
indeed! Do you suppose I am going to let
you out of this house without hearing from
you, or from that person who is most
improperly whispering to you at this very
moment, some explanation of the abstracting
and purloining and snatching of the keys of
the north rooms?"

"Ah! it is that you want to know?" said
Uncle Joseph, stimulated to plunge headlong
into an excuse by the increasing agitation
and terror of his niece. "See, now! I shall
explain. What was it, dear and good sir,
that we said when we were first let in?
This:—'We have come to see the house.'
Now, there is a north side to the house,
and a west side to the house. Good!
That is two sides; and I and my niece
are two people; and we divide
ourselves  in two, to see the two sides. I am
the half that goes west, with you and the
dear and good lady behind there. My niece
here is the other half that goes north, all by
herself, and drops the keys, and falls into a
faint, because in that old part of the house it
is what you call musty-fusty, and there is
smells of tombs and spiders, and that is all
the explanation, and quite enough, too. I
wish you good day, sir."

"Damme! if ever I met with the like of
you before!" roared Mr. Munder, entirely
forgetting his dignity, his respectability, and
his long words, in the exasperation of the
moment. "You are going to have it all
your own way, are you, Mr. Foreigner?
You will walk out of this place when you
please, will you, Mr. Foreigner? We will
see what the justice of the peace for this
district has to say to that," cried Mr. Munder,
recovering his solemn manner and his lofty
phraseology. "Property in this house is
confided to my care; and unless I hear some
satisfactory explanation of the purloining of
those keys, hanging up there, sir, on that
wall, sir, before your eyes, sir—I shall
consider it my duty to detain you, and the
person with you, until I can get legal advice,
and lawful advice, and magisterial advice.
Do you hear that, sir?"

Uncle Joseph's ruddy cheeks suddenly
deepened in colour, and his face assumed an
expression which made the housekeeper
rather uneasy, and which had an irresistibly
cooling effect on the heat of Mr. Munder's
anger. "You will keep us here? You? said
the old man, speaking very quietly, and looking
very steadily at the steward. "Now, see. I
take this lady (courage, my child, courage!
there is nothing to tremble for)—I take this
lady with me; I throw that door open—so!
I stand and wait before it; and I say to you,
'Shut that door against us, if you dare.'"

At this defiance, Mr. Munder advanced a
few steps, and then stopped. If Uncle Joseph's
steady look at him had wavered for an
instant, he would have closed the door.

''I say again," repeated the old man, "shut
it against us, if you dare. The laws and
customs of your country, sir, have made of me
an Englishman. If you can talk into one ear
of a magistrate, I can talk into the other. If
he must listen to you, a citizen of this
country, he must listen to me, a citizen of
this country also. Say the word, if you
please. Do you accuse? or do you threaten?
or do you shut the door?"

Before Mr. Munder could reply to any one