Orme drove his heel against the wall. The tiles did not break. Then he stepped back toward the middle of the chamber.
“Where are you, Girl?” he asked.
“Here,” she answered, very near him.
He reached out and found her hand, and she did not withdraw it from his clasp.
“The rascal has locked us in,” he said. “I’m afraid we shall have a long wait.”
“Will it do any good to shout?”
“No one could hear us through these walls. No, there’s nothing to do but remain quiet. But you needn’t stand, Girl.”
He led her to the wall. Removing his coat, he folded it and placed it on the floor for a cushion, and she seated herself upon it. He remained standing near by.
“The papers,” he said, “are in that coat you are sitting on.”
He laughed, with a consciousness of the grim and terrible humor of their situation—which he hoped she had not yet realized. Here they were, the hard-sought papers in their possession, yet they were helpless even to save their own lives.