He made swiftly to free himself, but now I held him tight, clipped him to me with such a new savagery and strength that although he knee'd and wriggled brutally he could not struggle free. Footsteps were approaching—I knew whose—and I managed, during one more second of supreme endeavour and complex anticipatory delight, to hold on.
Lord Tawborough entered, took him by the scruff of the neck, wrenched him away from me, and flung him out of the room.
I liked Lord Tawborough.
"Les hommes!" commented Elise. "So that's the end of friend Fouquier."
It was. That same day he disappeared from the Château for ever.
It seemed as though the house had been cleansed of a foul atmosphere. The Countess, though already worrying about troubles and dangers ahead, seemed for the first time mistress in her own house.
"Let him do his worst," said Elise, "it isn't very much."
Only Suzanne was nowhere about, seen by none of us. At dinner that night she was not present. Her bedroom door was locked, and she would reply to no one, admit no one. Next day we burst open the door, found the room empty.
Suzanne had fled.
* * * * * * *