It did occur to him that the pistol he held might be loaded in one chamber only and that Deede Dawson might be scheming to induce him to throw away his solitary cartridge.
But a glance reassured him on that point.
“Let me see how you can shoot,” Deede Dawson repeated, leaning carelessly with folded arms against the wall a little distance away. “And I promise you I'll tell you where Ella is.”
Rupert lifted his pistol and was indeed on the very point of firing when he caught a glimpse of such evil triumph and delight in Deede Dawson's cold eyes that he hesitated and lowered the weapon, and at the same time, looking more closely, searching more intently for some indication of Deede Dawson's hidden purpose, he noticed, caught in the crack of the wardrobe door, a tiny shred of some blue material only just visible.
He remembered that sometimes of an afternoon Ella had been accustomed to wear a frock made of a material exactly like that of which so tiny a fragment showed now in the crack of the wardrobe door.
CHAPTER XXX. SOME EXPLANATIONS
He turned quickly towards Deede Dawson. Their eyes met, and in that mutual glance Rupert Dunsmore read that his suspicions were correct and Deede Dawson that his dreadful trap was discovered.
Neither spoke. For a brief moment they remained impassive, immobile, their eyes meeting like blows, and then Deede Dawson made one spring to seize again the revolver he had laid down in the hope of enticing Rupert into the awful snare prepared for him.
But quick as he was, Rupert was quicker still, and as Deede Dawson leaped he lifted his pistol and fired, though his aim was not at the man, but at the revolver lying on the top of the roll of carpet where Deede Dawson had placed it.