“Will you take my arm?”
She looked at him for a moment with awful, broken-spirited eyes.
“Yes. I will take your arm.”
He offered it to her with rigid punctiliousness of manner. He did not even look at her. He led her out of the room and down the three flights of stairs. As they passed by the open drawing-room door, the lovely woman who had called herself Lady Etynge stood near it and watched them with eyes no longer gentle.
“I have something to say to you, Madam,” he said; “When I place this young lady in the hands of her governess, I will come back and say it.”
“Is her governess Fräulein Hirsch?” asked the woman lightly.
“No. She is doubtless on her way back to Berlin—and von Hillern will follow her.”
There was only the first floor flight of stairs now. Robin could scarcely see her way. But Lord Coombe held her up firmly and, in a few moments more, the leering footman, grown pale, opened the large door, they crossed the pavement to the carriage, and she was helped in and fell, almost insensible, across Mademoiselle Vallé’s lap, and was caught in a strong arm which shook as she did.
“Ma chèrie,” she heard, “The Good God! Oh, the good—good God!—And Lord Coombe! Lord Coombe!”
Coombe had gone back to the house. Four men returned with him, two in plain clothes and two heavily-built policemen. They remained below, but Coombe went up the staircase with the swift lightness of a man of thirty.