JUNE had no idea of the time that she lay in a huddle against
the railing. But it may not have been so long in fact as it was in
experience. Shattered she might be, yet unknown to herself, there was
still a reserve of fighting power to draw upon.
Cold iron, moreover, and raw air had a magic of their own. Clear of
that mephitic room and the foul presence of Keller, a fine human
machine began slowly to renew itself. Except for a faint gleam from
the room out of which she had just come, stealing through the fanlight
of the door out of which she had been flung, there was not a sign of
light upon the staircase. The entire building appeared to be deserted.
Its stone-flagged steps were full of echoes as soon as she ventured to
move upon them; and when clinging to the railing for support she had
painfully descended two she entered a region of total darkness.
It was like going down into a pit. Could she have only been sure that
death awaited her below, she might have been tempted to fling herself
into it headlong. But she knew that the ground was not far off.
Three or four steps more brought her to the vestibule. At the end of it
was a door, open to the street. Outside this door shone a faint lamp,
round which weird shadows circled in a ghostly witch-dance. The night
beyond was a wall of horrors, which she had lost the will to face.
Met by this pitiless alternative, she recoiled against the wall of the
vestibule, huddling in its darkest corner, behind the stairs. Crouching
here, like a hunted thing at bay, she fought for the courage to go out
and face her destiny.
She fought in vain. Half collapsed as she now was, a spur was needed to
drive her into the grim wilderness of the open street. One glance at
the crypt outside sufficed to tell her that with no point to make for,
it would be best to stay where she was and hope soon to die.
Why had she not had the sense to throw herself down the stairs and kill
herself? A means would have to be found before the night was out. She
could bear no more. A terrible reaction was upon her. It was as if a
private door in her mind had suddenly given way and a school of awful
phantoms had rushed in and flooded it.
She was living in a nightmare that was too bad to be true. But it was
true and there lay its terror. Adrift in the dark canyons of that vast
city, penniless and alone, with the marks of thieves and murderers upon
her bruised body, and her treasure stolen, there was only one thing to
look for now.
Death, however, would not be easy to come by. As she huddled in cold
darkness in the recess behind the stairs she felt that her will was
going. To enter the night and make an end would need courage; but a
miserable clapping together of the jaws was sign enough that the last
hope of all was slipping away from her.