"Not the slightest fear of a fiasco this time," says Potts, comfortably.
CHAPTER XXIII.
"Here's such a coil! Come, what says Romeo?"
—Shakespeare.
As eleven o'clock strikes, any one going up the stairs at Herst would have stopped with a mingled feeling of terror and admiration at one particular spot, where, in a niche, upon a pedestal, a very goddess stands.
It is Molly, clad in white, from head to heel, with a lace scarf twisted round her head and shoulders, and with one bare arm uplifted, while with the other she holds an urn-shaped vase beneath her face, from which a pale-blue flame arises.
Her eyes, larger, deeper, bluer than usual, are fixed with sad and solemn meaning upon space. She scarcely seems to breathe; no quiver disturbs her frame, so intensely does she listen for a coming footstep. In her heart she hopes it may be Luttrell's.
The minutes pass. Her arm is growing tired, her eyes begin to blink against her will; she is on the point of throwing up the game, descending from her pedestal, and regaining her own room, when a footfall recalls her to herself and puts her on her mettle.
Nearer it comes,—still nearer, until it stops altogether. Molly does not dare turn to see who it is. A moment later, a wild cry, a smothered groan, falls upon her ear, and, turning her head, terrified, she sees her grandfather rush past her, tottering, trembling, until he reaches his own room, where he disappears.