if he pleased, to fresh disputes about money matters, and sun ply consulted him on the possibility of taking legal proceedings for Laura's protection in the event of her husband's refusal to allow her to leave Blackwater Park for a time and return with me to Limmeridge. I referred him to Mr Fairlie for the details of this last arrangement -- I assured him that I wrote with Laura's authority -- and I ended by entreating him to act in her name to the utmost extent of his power and with the least possible loss of time.

The letter to Mr Fairlie occupied me next. I appealed to him on the terms which I had mentioned to Laura as the most likely to make him bestir himself; I enclosed a copy of my letter to the lawyer to show him how serious the case was, and I represented our removal to Limmeridge as the only compromise which would prevent the danger and distress of Laura's present position from inevitably affecting her uncle as well as herself at no very distant time.

When I had done, and had sealed and directed the two envelopes, I went back with the letters to Laura's room, to show her that they were written.

`Has anybody disturbed you?' I asked, when she opened the door to me.

`Nobody has knocked,' she replied. `But I heard some one in the outer room.'

`Was it a man or a woman?'

`A woman. I heard the rustling of her gown.'

`A rustling like silk?'

`Yes, like silk.'

Madame Fosco had evidently been watching outside. The mischief she might do by herself was little to be feared. But the mischief she might do, as a willing instrument in her husband's hands, was too formidable to be overlooked.

`What became of the rustling of the gown when you no longer heard it in the ante-room?' I inquired. `Did you hear it go past your wall, along the passage?'

`Yes. I kept still and listened, and just heard it.'

`Which way did it go?'

`Towards your room.'

I considered again. The sound had not caught my ears. But I was then deeply absorbed in my letters, and I write with a heavy hand and a quill pen, scraping and scratching noisily over the paper. It was more likely that Madame Fosco would hear the scraping of my pen than that I should hear the rustling of her dress. Another reason (if I had wanted one) for not trusting my letters to the post-bag in the hall.

Laura saw me thinking. `More difficulties!' she said wearily; `more difficulties and more dangers!'

`No dangers,' I replied. `Some little difficulty, perhaps. I am thinking of the safest way of putting my two letters into Fanny's hands.'

`You have really written them, then? Oh, Marian, run no risks -- pray, pray, run no risks!'

`No, no -- no fear. Let me see -- what o'clock is it now?'

It was a quarter to six. There would be time for me to get to the village inn, and to come back again before dinner. If I waited till the evening I might find no second opportunity of safely leaving the house.