"You'd better stay where you are," answered Lucy, in her most matter-of-fact tones, as she led the terrified Fan to an arm-chair.
Phyllis stood among them silent, gazing from one to the other, with that strange, bright look in her eyes, which with her betokened excitement; the unimpassioned, impersonal excitement of a spectator at a thrilling play.
"Certainly I shall go," said Gertrude, as a door banged violently below, to the accompaniment of a volley of polyglot curses.
"I will not stay in this awful house another hour," panted Fanny, from her arm-chair. "Gertrude, Gertrude, if you leave this room I shall die!"
With a sickening of the heart, for she knew not what horror she was about to encounter, Gertrude made her way downstairs, the cries and sounds of struggling growing louder at each step. At the bottom of the first flight she paused.
"Go back, Phyllis."
"It's no good, Gerty, I'm not going back."
"I am going to the shop; and if the Maryons are not there we must call a policeman."
Swiftly they went down the next flight, past the horrible doors, on the other side of which the battle was raging, still downwards, till they reached the little narrow hall. Here they drew up suddenly before a figure which barred the way.