"All right," he said, not looking at her.
"You're not going to desert us already?" said Hyde; still, as she felt, mocking her with his smile. "It will be dark, indeed, when Hope is withdrawn."
He went to the door, but paused with his hand upon it. She looked at him with the wild shrinking of a trapped creature in her eyes.
"Never mind," he laughed softly; "I am very tenacious. Even now—you will scarcely believe it—I still have—Hope!"
He opened the door with the words, and, as she passed through in unbroken silence, her face as white as marble, there was something in his words, something of self-assured power, almost of menace, that struck upon her like a breath of evil. She would have stayed and defied him had she dared. But somehow, inexplicably, she was afraid.
VII
THE SCRAPE
Very late that night there came a low knock at Hope's door. She was lying awake, and she instantly started up on her elbow.