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.
CHAPTER THE FOURTH—HE BECOMES PART OF THE GAME
I
THE face hung there against the darkness for a second; then the leaves closed over it as it was stealthily withdrawn. In the utterness of his astonishment, Hindwood all but gave himself away. It was not the face he had expected.