She tried to speak, but, with terror sobbing in her throat, the words failed. She made a step forward with a crazy impulse to rush past him.
He straightened, with a quick movement toward her. She recoiled before him, precipitately retreated, closed the door, shot the bolt, and leaned, for faintness, against the wall. She expected each moment to hear him tap. She neither heard a knock nor the sound of soft, departing feet. He was still there! He was on guard! He had had good reason for his terrible certainty! He had foreseen what her plan might be, and she knew he would no more let her get past him down the hall than the turnkey will let the wretched prisoner escape.
The last flicker of her courage died at that thought. All her fine exultation was beaten out by the fact of the brute force outside her door. She could not get to Kerr now. Cowering behind her door she could only fancy him waiting for her in the rotunda while the moments lengthened into hours, each moment distrusting her more.
XXII
CLARA'S MARKET
All night she sat awake huddled under her greatcoat in the chilly darkness. She could not lie down, she could not close her eyes. At long intervals she heard the tread of unshod feet along the hall, and then she held her breath lest at her slightest stir they approach her door. Why, since he wanted the sapphire, hadn't he tried to get it from her when he had had her unawares, upon her threshold with the house asleep? It began to seem to her as if he were waiting, as if he were forced to wait, for some appointed moment. She knew if it were his moment it would be hers, too, as long as she had the sapphire upon her. She recalled fearfully the moment when she had crouched against the window with her hand protecting the jewel, and Harry's hand grasping her wrist. He would know well enough where to find it now. Oh, the restless unconcealable thing! Where could she hide it?
She took the pear-shaped pouch that swung always before her on her long gold chain. She had repudiated that hiding-place before, but now the more obvious the better—now that both men supposed she carried the jewel far hidden out of sight. Without moving from the bed where she was crouched, cramped and cold, she made the exchange, leaving the chain still around her neck, dropping the jewel into the pouch, where it would swing free, so carelessly dangling as to be beyond suspicion, but never beyond the reach of her hand.
It was a pale, splendid dawning full of clouds when she feel asleep.