“Stop it,” she said; “Don’t fumble so ridiculously. Don’t you know how to take the thing off the hooks?”
She laughed at him derisively; her face disappeared as if she were about to continue her upward journey. Then once more she was looking down at him:
“Tell whoever it is,” she said, “that Sir William is in Paris and Lady Hudson in bed. Say ’sir’ when you speak, and they’ll think it’s the second footman, Moddle! Don’t you remember Moddle?” And again she laughed, and her ascent of the stairs was marked by the tips of her fingers, visible as if they were little white and creeping mice.
Dudley Leicester put the receiver to his ear. A peremptory “Are you 4,259 Mayfair?” made him suddenly afraid, as if a schoolmaster had detected him in some crime. Hitherto he had had no feeling of crime. It was as if he had merely existed in the tide of his senses. An equally peremptory “Don’t go away” was succeeded by the words: “Get down,” and then:
“Is that Sir William Hudson’s?”
Leicester answered—he had the words clearly fixed in his mind—but already he was panting:
“Yes, but Sir William’s in Paris, and Lady Hudson in bed.” And he did not omit to add “sir.”
Through his mind, quickened by his emotions of fear, there shot the idea that now they must go away; that it was all over; that he was very tired; that he must sit down and rest.
Then suddenly—still low, distinct, stealthy, and clear—the voice of the invisible man asked:
“Isn’t that Dudley Leicester speaking?”