I shall be carrying out a somewhat elaborate experiment--upstairs.

If I go out at all" he waited a moment, and again he looked at her fixedly "-- I shall wait till night-time to do so." And then, coming back to the matter in hand, he added hastily, "Perhaps you could do my room when I go upstairs, about five o'clock--if that time is convenient to you, that is ?" "Oh, yes, sir! That'll do nicely!" Mrs.Bunting went downstairs, and as she did so she took herself wordlessly, ruthlessly to task, but she did not face--even in her inmost heart--the strange tenors and tremors which had so shaken her.

She only repeated to herself again and again, "I've got upset -- that's what I've done," and then she spoke aloud, "I must get myself a dose at the chemist's next time I'm out.

That's what I must do." And just as she murmured the word "do," there came a loud double knock on the front door.
It was only the postman's knock, but the postman was an unfamiliar visitor in that house, and Mrs.Bunting started violently.

She was nervous, that's what was the matter with her,--so she told herself angrily.