I had the highest regard for Kortes, but he was not a very cheering companion for an adventure. Given the same desperate circumstances, Denny would have been serenely confident of success and valiantly scornful of our opponent. I heaved a regretful sigh for him, and said to Kortes, with a little irritation:
‘Hang it, we’ve come out right side up before now, and we may again. Hadn’t we better rouse her?’
During this conversation Kortes had been standing on the lowest step of the staircase, and I facing him, on the floor of the hall, with one hand resting on the balustrade. We had talked in low tones, partly from a fear of eavesdroppers, even more, I think, from the influence which our position exerted over us. In peril men speak softly. Our voices sounded as no more than faint murmurs in the roomy hall; consequently they could not have been audible—where? In the passage!
But as I spoke to Kortes in a petulant reproachful whisper, a sound struck on my ear, a very little sound. I caught my companion’s arm, imposing silence on him by a look. The sound came again. I knew the sound; I had heard it before. I stepped back a pace and looked round the balustrade to the spot where the entrance to the passage lay.
I should have been past surprise now, after my sojourn in Neopalia; but I was not. I sprang back, with a cry of wonder, almost (must I admit it?) of alarm. Small and faint as the noise had been, it had sufficed for the opening of the door, and in the opening made by the receding of the planks were the head and shoulders of a man. His face was hardly a yard from my face; and the face was the face of Constantine Stefanopoulos.
In the instant of paralysed immobility that followed, the explanation flashed like lightning through my brain. Constantine, buying his liberty and pardon from Mouraki, had stolen along the passage. He had opened the door. He hoped to find me alone—if not alone, yet off my guard—in the hall. Then a single shot would be enough. His errand would be done, his pardon won. That my explanation was right the revolver in his hand witnessed. But he also was surprised. I was closer than he thought, so close that he started back for an instant. The interval was enough; before he could raise his weapon and take aim I put my head down between my shoulders and rushed at him. I think my head knocked his arm up, his revolver went off, the noise reverberating through the hall. I almost had hold of him when I was suddenly seized from behind and hurled backwards. Kortes had a mind to come first and stood on no ceremony. But in the instant that he was free, Constantine dived down, like a rabbit into a burrow. He disappeared; with a shouted oath Kortes sprang after him. I heard the feet of both of them clattering down the flight of steps.
For a single moment I paused. The report had echoed loud through the hall. The sentries must have heard it—the sentries before the house, the sentries in the compound behind the house. Yet none of them rushed in: not a movement, not a word, not a challenge came from them. Mouraki Pasha kept good discipline. His orders were law, his directions held good, though shots rang loud and startling through the house. Even at that moment I gave a short sharp laugh; for I remembered that on no account was Lord Wheatley to be interrupted; no, neither Lord Wheatley nor the man who came to kill Lord Wheatley was to be interrupted. Oh, Mouraki, Mouraki, your score was mounting up! Should you ever pay the reckoning?
Shorter far than it has taken to write my thoughts was the pause during which they galloped through my palpitating brain. In a second I also was down the flight of stairs beyond. I heard still the footsteps in front of me, but I could see nothing. It was very dark that night in the passage. I ran on, yet I seemed to come no nearer to the steps in front of me. But suddenly I paused, for now there were steps behind me also, light steps, but sounding distinct in my ear. Then a voice cried, in terror and distress, ‘My lord, don’t leave me, my lord!’
I turned. Even in the deep gloom I saw a gleam of white: a moment later I caught Phroso by both her hands.
‘The shot, the shot?’ she whispered.