Mr. Marx's Secret by E. Phillips Oppenheim

It was late when I reached home and, from the darkness in all the windows, I concluded that my mother and the one country domestic who comprised our little household had already retired. My hand was raised to rap at the closed door, when it occurred to me that I might just as well effect an entrance without disturbing anyone. Our sitting-room window opened on to the front garden in which I stood and was seldom fastened, so I stole softly over the sodden grass and pressed the sash upwards. It yielded easily to my touch and, gently raising myself on to the low stone window-sill, I vaulted into the room.

At first I thought it was, as I had expected to find it, empty. But it was not so. Through the open window by which I had just entered the moonlight was streaming in, casting long, fantastic rays upon the well-worn carpet and across the quaint, old-fashioned furniture and on the white tablecloth, on which my homely evening meal had been left prepared. But my eyes never rested for a moment on any of these familiar objects, scarcely even noticed them, for another and a stranger sight held me spellbound. At the farther end of the room, where the shadows hung darkest and the moonbeams but feebly penetrated, was the kneeling figure of a woman.