“Get your mouth full,” she whispered, filling her own as she spoke—“so full you can’t speak—it’ll give you time to think.”
And then the door opened, and in a moment the room was full of gentlemen in riding dress, with very stern faces. And they all had swords.
Betty, with her mouth quite full, was trying not to look towards the panel.
Elfrida, whose mouth was equally full, looked at the gentleman who seemed to be leading the others, and remarked—
“This is a nice time of night to come knocking people up!”
“‘NOW,’ SAID A DOZEN VOICES, ‘THE TRUTH, LITTLE MISS.’”
“All hours are alike to a loyal subject,” said a round, fat, blue-eyed gentleman in a green suit. “Have you any strangers under your roof to-night?”
“Oh!” cried Bet, “all is lost!”
The gentlemen exchanged glances and crowded round her. Elfrida shrugged the shoulders of her mind—if a mind has shoulders—and told herself that it didn’t matter. History knew best, no doubt, and whatever seemed to be happening now was only history.