Tiptoeing to the threshold, he turned the handle and peeped into the
passage. As before, everything was in darkness.
He was free to go. There was nothing to stop him--nothing except his
honor. It was easy to argue that even his honor did not prevent him. He
had canceled his parole when he had reopened negotiations by telling her
to pick up her revolver. She had left it behind her on the mantel-shelf.
He took it in his hand and examined it. It was a repeater. Every chamber
was loaded. He whistled softly--so she had meant business! Setting the
hammer at half-cock, he slipped the weapon in his pocket. He was master
of the situation now.
Why didn't he go? Two hours of steady driving, three at the most, and
he could be in London. He reminded himself that at this very moment his
private papers might be in the process of being ransacked. What if they
were? The possibility left him utterly indifferent. He couldn't save
them after the lapse of another three hours.
No, the truth was that since his voyage on the _Ryndam_ all the emphases
of his life were becoming altered. The importance of money and power
no longer seemed paramount. After nearly forty years of living, he had
awakened to the fact that it was women who shed a radiance of glamour
in an otherwise gloomy world. Of all human adventures they were the most
enthralling and the least certain of rewarding.
It was curiosity that had enticed him into his present entanglements;
his curiosity had yet to be satisfied. With a revolver in his pocket, he
felt that he now possessed the means of extracting the right answers to
his questions. He had suffered mild inconveniences, but so far he
hadn't done so badly. He had established mysterious relations with two
beautiful women. One of them was already under the same roof; the other,
he believed, was momentarily expected. He began to figure himself as a
poet, a dreamer, a potential storm-center of romance.
“And all because she has blue eyes!” he hinted.
Then he remembered that Santa's eyes were gray, and that up to the last
half-hour it had been Santa whom he had supposed that he was following.
He gazed about him, making an inspection of the room, trying to guess
at the characters of its inhabitants. It was square and small. Its walls
were lined ceiling-high with shelves overloaded with books of a learned
appearance. A work-basket stood on a mahogany desk with mending,
scissors, and reels of cotton strewn near it. A piano had been crushed
into a corner, looking flippantly out of place amid these scholarly
surroundings. Below the mantelshelf was a rack containing a row of
pipes. Set about wherever a space allowed were vases of freshly cut
flowers.
The contradictions of the room suggested that it had once been a man's
den, but had now been taken over by a woman. This seemed to indicate
that the owner of the house was actually a widow.
Almost the whole of the wall confronting the door was occupied by a tall
French window, which opened directly on a lawn. Shrubs grew waist-high
about it. Instinct told him that this was the likeliest approach for
the other person, by whose order his kidnaping had been plotted. He felt
convinced that this person would prove to be a woman, but he was taking
no chances. With the night behind her, she could spy on him for hours
without being detected. She might be spying on him now.
Assuming a listless manner, he seated himself to one side of the
fireplace. Out of the tail of his eye, without seeming to do so, he
watched the shadowy panes. His right hand was thrust into his pocket,
gripping the revolver.
After the lapse of some minutes, he heard in the passage the widow's
returning footsteps. Outside the door she halted, fumbling at the
handle. Giving up the attempt, she called to him to open. Just as he was
rising, a face, tense with eagerness, lifted itself out of the bushes,
peering in on him.