And now, with infinite precautions, the girl descended the stairs, feeling her way, for she dared not use her light. She was taking a risk, but she might be taking a greater risk by staying upstairs. She had a vague feeling that something was about to happen in this vast, gloomy house or that something already had happened. She felt herself stifling. At any cost she must escape from these confining walls, she must get out under the open stars where she could breathe. And she remembered, with a clutch of fear, that old Mrs. Pottle had spoken of a haunted room in Ipping House whence a gray lady came forth at night and wandered through the halls, a gray lady whose coming was attended by clanking chains and sounds as of a heavy body dragging.
Even as these gruesome thoughts chilled her heart the girl's foot touched the lowest stair and a moment later, as she stepped out gropingly into the black hall, she felt herself held from behind, as by a hand, whereupon, in a burst of terror, she tore herself violently free. At the same instant there resounded through the house a great clanking of metal and the crash of a heavy body falling. Then silence again, while Hester stood still frozen with fear. And now, from the direction of the conservatory, there came a piercing, agonized shriek.
It was an emergency to daunt the stoutest heart, but Hester rose to it, conquering her panic, because she realized that she must conquer it. Everything depended upon what she did in the next few minutes: her happiness, her freedom, her whole existence depended upon her getting out of this house immediately. Some frightful thing had happened that would presently throw the whole establishment into tumult.
Another shriek rang through the house, a pitiful cry of distress and call for help. What could be happening? Hester herself was moved to bring succor to this poor lady, but she checked her impulse as the sense of her own danger came to her with the quick opening of a door overhead and the sound of heavy footsteps on the stairs. It was Robert Baxter, hurrying down from the second floor, and calling as he came:
"Mother! Where are you? What is it?" he cried, and Hester heard him turn down the corridor on the first floor. He was going to his mother's room. There! He had found it empty. He was rushing back to the stairs.
"Mother!" he shouted again. "Where are you?"
Huddled in the hall below, Hester thought of the front door, but she knew it was chained and bolted. There was no time to escape that way. Already Robert was on the stairs, descending slowly in the darkness. It was lucky he had not stopped to get a candle.
Swiftly the Storm girl retreated into the library. Her case was desperate. Mrs. Baxter was in the conservatory, so her escape that way was blocked. To hide in the house now would be madness. It was only a matter of minutes when the whole household would be aroused, when lights would be blazing in every room and——
Then came the inspiration. It was a wild, last chance, but she must take it. A few moments before she had noticed a motor veil left by some one on the davenport. She snatched this up and, moving silently toward the conservatory, draped it over her face and figure. The veil was of elastic, filmy material, long and wide. It covered the girl from head to foot, shrouding her in silver gray.
At the open door leading into the conservatory Hester paused and, settling her ghostly draperies about her, stood still. Through the crack of the door she could see Mrs. Baxter in the conservatory, rigid with fright, still holding her candle and staring wide-eyed before her.