Then she shut the kitchen door.
In a little while, however, as stillness reigned in the house, some presentiment of evil made him think it would be as well to go and see if Mrs.Martha had finished trying on her finery and gone to bed as usual.
He found the kitchen dark and empty.

He went to the foot of her stairs.
There was no chink of light showing from her room.

The stillness of the place entered into his mind as the thin edge of a wedge of alarm.

"Mrs.
Martha!" he called in sonorous voice.

"Mrs.Martha!" But no one answered.