That day had arrived.
There was only one thing that he could do; his Friend alone in all the
world could help him. With his soul dizzy and faint from fear, he prayed
for his Friend; had he been less frightened he would have screamed aloud
for him to come and help him.
The boy's breath came hot into his throat and stuck there, and his heart
beat like a high, unresting hammer.
Mrs. Carter, with the candle raised to throw light in front of her,
moved forward very cautiously and softly. She passed down the passage,
and then paused very near to the boy. She looked at the keys, and stole
like some heavy, stealthy animal to the door of the long drawing-room.
He watched her as she tried one key after another, making little
dissatisfied noises as they refused to fit; then at last one turned the
lock and she pushed back the door.
It was certainly impossible for him, in the dim world of his mind, to
realise what it was that she intended to do, but he knew, through some
strange channel of knowledge, that his mother was concerned in this, and
that something more than the immediate peril of himself was involved.
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