"We could explain, couldn't we—I mean about the storm and the door being open?"
"Hardly—this shooting lodge, my child,—this forest, too, is the property of the De Cahors. See—" and he showed her the book.
"O Philidor! What shall we do?"
"Get out at once. They mustn't see you at any cost. If they come you must take to the bushes, and meet me in Hauterire. It's a case of the devil take the hindmost—the hindmost being me and the devil being—" he paused significantly.
"Olga! Do you think she can be shooting, too?"
He shrugged. "She's quite apt to be doing precisely that," he said shortly.
Hermia flew to the window and, unlatching the shutter, peered timidly forth. Markham heard her gasp and looked over her shoulder through the aperture.
"Olga!" she whispered in dismay.
There in the path to the deep wood, smartly attired in gaiters, a short skirt and Alpine hat, her shotgun in the hollow of her arm, was Nemesis. She came up the path at a leisurely gait, and stopped not a hundred feet away, her head held upon one side, smiling and carelessly surveying the premises.
Hermia shrank back and huddled down upon the couch.