"Don't you worry your head about me," said Jerry cheerfully. "You're tired out, you know. You really ought to go to bed. Let's have something rousing, with a chorus, and then we'll say good-night."
He took up his banjo again, and dashed without preliminary into the gay strains of "The Girl I Left Behind Me."
He sang with a gaiety that even Nan did not imagine to be feigned, and, lest lack of response should again damp his spirits, she forced herself to join in the refrain. Faster and faster went Jerry's fingers, faster and faster ran the song, his voice and Nan's mingling, till at last he broke off with a shout of laughter, and sprang to his feet.
"There! That's the end of our soirée, and I'm not going to keep you up a minute longer. I wonder if we're snowed up yet. We'll have some fun to-morrow, if we are. I say, look at the time! Good-night! Good-night!"
He advanced towards her. She was standing facing him, with her back to the fire. But something—something in her eyes—arrested him, sending his own glancing backwards over his shoulder. She was looking, not at him, but beyond him.
The next instant, with a sharp oath, Jerry had wheeled in his tracks. He, too, stood facing the door, staring wide-eyed, dumbfounded.
There, at the head of the stairs, quite motionless, quite silent, facing them both, stood Piet Cradock.
CHAPTER XI
Nan was the first to free herself from the nightmare paralysis that bound her. Swiftly, as though in answer to a sudden inner urging, she moved forward. She almost pushed past Jerry in her haste. She was white, white to the lips with fear, but she never faltered till she stood between her husband and the boy she had chosen to protect her. The first glimpse of Piet had revealed to her in what mood he had come. In his right hand he was gripping her father's heaviest hunting-crop.