Once or twice he tried to speak, but the man sharply bade him be quiet. About sundown, a step was heard on the stairs, and once again the boy was hastily placed in his hiding place, with threats of punishment if he cried.
The new arrival was only a model, in search of work. The man spoke to her gruffly, and informed her that he had all the models he needed. After she left, he did not again release the child, but sat, reading, for a long time.
At last he rose, took up the short black cylinder, which Grace saw was an electric searchlight, from the table, and went over and sat in the sill of the large double window which faced to the north. The window was open, and the room in darkness.
Grace pushed the door of her closet open slightly, so as to get a better view. The window was directly opposite the closet, at the other end of the room. She could see the silent figure of the watcher, silhouetted blackly against the night sky without. Off to the north were many lights—the lights of the houses toward the Champs Élysées, and the Arc de Triomphe.
For many minutes she watched, over the man's shoulder, waiting for the signal which would set both herself and Mr. Stapleton's boy free from their long confinement.
Presently she heard the man utter a quick oath, and saw him peer out of the window, his figure tense and rigid, a pair of field glasses held to his eyes. In another moment he had dropped the glasses, picked up his electric searchlight, and flashed a signal into the darkness.
It took him but a moment. In another he had rushed to the door, and Grace heard him turn the key in the lock and clatter down the stairs.
She crept swiftly to the window and looked out. At first she could see nothing, but a confused maze of lights. In a moment she had seized the field glasses and was nervously sweeping the horizon. Suddenly she held them still for a moment, then drew back with a cry of dismay. Far off toward the Avenue Kleber there gleamed a light, high in the upper room of a house. It shone for a few moments, steady, baleful, full of unknown terror, then winked suddenly out and was gone. She dropped the field glasses upon the floor and staggered back against the table. The light was red! She was locked in. The two men would undoubtedly be back in fifteen or twenty minutes. And then—she shuddered as she thought of what they intended to do to the kidnapped child. To herself she gave scarcely a thought. Then Richard's face came before her eyes, and she fell upon the window seat, sobbing bitterly.