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Lucille had become quite ill when she discovered that the peacock-feather fan had been taken away.
    o wonder,she said, hat there was all that fuss about it. Mr. Fabian should never have told you to take it. There was no way that you could know. Sheer mischief, I call it.
    hy should a fan be so important?
    h, there is something about peacocksfeathers. I have heard they are unlucky.
    I wondered whether this theory might have something to do with Greek mythology and if it did my father would certainly know about it. I decided to risk a lecture session with him and ask.
    ather,I said, iss Lucille at the House had a fan made of peacock feathers. There is something special about it. Is there any reason why there should be anything important about peacocksfeathers?
    ell, Hera put the eyes of Argus into the peacock tail. Of course, you know the story.
    Of course I did not, but I asked to hear it.
    It turned out to be another of those about Zeus courting someone. This time it was the daughter of the King of Argos and Zeus wife, Hera, discovered this.
    he shouldn have been surprised,I said. e was always courting someone he shouldn.
    hat true. He turned the fair maiden into a white cow.
    hat was a change. He usually transformed himself.
    n this occasion it was otherwise. Hera was jealous.
    not surprised with such a husband. But she should have grown used to his ways.
    he set the monster Argus who had one hundred eyes to watch. Knowing this, Zeus sent Hermes to lull him to sleep with his lyre and when he was asleep to kill him. Hera was angry when she learned what had happened and placed the eyes of the dead monster in the tails of the peacocks.
    s that why the feathers are unlucky?
    re they? When I come to think of it, I fancy I have heard something of that nature.
    So he could not tell me more than that. I thought to myself: It is because of the eyes. They are watching all the time as Argus failed to do. Why should Miss Lucille worry so much because the eyes are not there to watch for her?
    The mystery deepened. What an amazing house it was, having a ghost in the form of a long-dead nun as well as a magic fan with eyes to watch out for its owner. Did it, I wondered, warn of impending disaster?
    I felt that anything could happen in that house; there was so much to discover and, in spite of the fact that I was plain and only asked because there was no one else to be a companion to Lavinia, I wanted to go on visiting the house.
    It was a week or so after the incident of the fan that I discovered I was being watched. When I rode in the paddock I was aware of an irresistible urge to look up at a certain window high in the wall and it was from this one that I felt I was being observed. A shadow at the window was there for a moment and then disappeared. Several times I thought I saw someone there. It was quite uncanny.
    I said to Miss Etherton, hich part of the house is it that looks over the paddock?
    hat is the west wing. It is not used very much. Miss Lucille is there. They always think of it as her part of the house.
    I had guessed that might be so and now I was sure.
    One day when I took my horse to the stable, Lavinia ran on ahead and, as I was about to return to the house, I saw Ayesha. She came swiftly towards me and, taking my hand, looked into my face.
    She said, iss Drusilla, I have waited to find you alone. Miss Lucille wants very much to speak to you.
    hat?I cried. ow?
    es,she answered. his moment.
    avinia will be waiting for me.
    ever mind that one now.
    I followed her into the house and up the staircase, along corridors to the room in the west wing where Miss Lucille was waiting for me.
    She was seated in a chair near the window that looked down on the paddock and from which she had watched me.
    ome here, child,she said.
    I went to her. She took my hand and looked searchingly into my face. ring a chair, Ayesha,she said.
    Ayesha brought one and it was placed very near Miss Lucille.
    Ayesha then withdrew and I was alone with the