"Go in and win," Balmayne whispered. "Always back your luck."
Leona Lalage came to the house at length. So far as she could see no lights were anywhere except in the hall, where there was a faint spot of gas. Everything was going to turn out favourably. Evidently the landlady had gone to bed, or the gas would not be so low. It was easy to pick the latchkey out of the bunch that she held in her hand. The lock turned easily and smoothly, and she was in the hall.
Silence everywhere. Evidently the whole household was in bed. There was another tiny crumb of gas burning on the landing, just outside Isidore's sitting-room door. The door of the room was closed. Leona opened it quietly and boldly and entered. The place was in absolute darkness.
Where was she to find the matches, for she had none of her own? She fumbled her way to the fireplace, but could find nothing she required. It seemed to her that she could hear somebody breathing in the room besides herself. But this she put down to the worn and disordered state of her nerves.
Ah, there were the matches at last. She could hear them rattling as they fell to the floor. She struck one, and the sudden flare half blinded her. Then she turned all the burners on, and the sudden glitter of it made her start. Really she was a good deal more ill and shaky than she had imagined.
Light at last. The blinds were up, but that did not matter. Leona turned and looked round the room. A man, seated in a chair, a dark and gloomy man with brooding eyes, rose and confronted her.
"A strange place to meet," he said, "but we have met at last."
Leona Lalage strove to speak, but the words froze on her lips. She was face to face with Garrett Charlton!