“Heaven protect them!” exclaimed Britomarte, clasping her hands and thinking of her friends.
Then she suddenly started up and ran to the door to listen for their coming.
As she got there she heard rapid steps and hurried speech, followed immediately by loud knocks.
She tore the door open, and they rushed in, Justin, Judith and—the pirate captain—followed by the raving storm.
Justin, exerting all his great strength, closed and barred the door against the wind and then turned to Britomarte and whispered hurriedly:
“Dear sister, go into your parlor. I will join you there presently and explain.”
Britomarte followed his advice, and went back to the parlor, attended by Judith.
“Judith,” as soon as they had reached the room and closed the door, “tell me how Mr. Rosenthal came to bring that man here to-night? I am glad that he has done so, but I wish to know how he happened to do it.”
A blinding flash of lightning that shot arrows of fire through every crack and seam of the house, and a deafening crash of thunder, like the explosion of a planet overhead, interrupted Judith in her answer. Instead of replying, she muttered a pater and told her beads. And it was not till all was temporarily silent again, and Miss Conyers had repeated her question, that Judith answered:
“Divil a bit iv me knows at all, at all. Sure I was running back to the house as fast as me two heels could fetch me, to get out iv the storm, when I fell over thim both, close to the door here. And nivir a worrd was spoken anyther side. And now, ma’am, wid your lave, I’ll just go and change me clothes, for divil’s a dhry thread is on me at all, at all, wid the rain that came down by bucket fulls.”