“They are attacking the house,” said the girl quickly. “I don’t know who ‘they’ are, but they’ve just struck down one of the men who was protecting us. Take the gun, Alma.”
Alma’s face was contorted, and might have expressed fear or anger or both. Mirabelle afterwards learnt that the dominant emotion was one of satisfaction to find herself in so warlike an environment.
Running into the drawing-room, the girl pushed open the window, which commanded a view of the road. The gate was unfastened and two men, who had evidently been concealed inside the trolley, were lifting the unconscious man, and she watched, with a calm she could not understand in herself, as they threw him into the interior and fastened the tailboard. She counted four in all, including the driver, who was climbing back to his seat. One of the new-comers, evidently the leader, was pointing down the road towards the lane, and she guessed that he was giving directions as to where the car should wait, for it began to go backwards almost immediately and with surprising smoothness, remembering the exhibition it had given of decrepitude a few minutes before.
The man who had given instructions came striding down the path towards the door.
“Stop!”
He looked round with a start into the levelled muzzle of a Browning, and his surprise would, in any other circumstances, have been comical.
“It’s all right, miss——” he began.
“Put yourself outside that gate,” said Mirabelle coolly.
“I wanted to see you . . . very important——”
Bang!