“Lucky for you I didn’t give point,” he muttered.
Then aloud: “Once more, in the King’s name, open this door!”
“I’d die first,” said Lady Gowan to herself; and she stood close to the foot of the great staircase listening, and hardly daring to breathe, as she strained her ears to catch some sound of what might be going on upstairs, her wildly dilated eyes fixed the while on the slips of windows on either side of the door. But from within the house all she could hear was a low sobbing from the housekeeper’s room below, and the murmur of her old servant’s voice as she tried to calm the hysterical girl who was nearly crazy with terror.
But her attention was taken up directly by the voices outside, which came plainly to her through the broken windows.
“Well?” said the officer sharply; and she knew by the reply that one of the men must have climbed the iron railings and been down into the area.
“Both windows covered with big iron bars, sir, and the door seems a reg’lar thick ’un.”
“How long will they be getting back, sergeant, with the hammer and crowbars?”
“’Nother ten minutes or quarter-hour, sir.”
“Bah! Well, run round to the back, and tell them to keep a sharp look-out. See that the men are well awake at the end of the street, and keep two more ready back and front to stop every one who comes out of the houses in case he tries to escape by the roof.”
“Yes, sir.”