"I am absolutely indifferent with regard to myself!" she exclaimed. "I have come here to have it out with you ... I demand an explanation here--now--instantly--on the spot."
"With pleasure, gracious baroness," he answered, "but first, for God's sake, move away from the window."
Whereupon he cast a swift, keen, nervous glance across at the windows of the castle, which so far looked unsuspecting enough.
Shocked by his rudeness, she fled into the interior of the apartment. It was low-ceilinged, dark, and badly furnished, like a labourer's dwelling. The obnoxious doggy odour was here more strongly apparent. Where it came from was a mystery revealed a moment later, when, as she approached the wall at the back of the room, something snapped viciously at her foot, and two little circlets of fire gleamed angrily in the dusk.
"Behave yourself. Tommy," he commanded as she drew back with a cry.
So it was Tommy, the third party to the Triple Alliance!
She leaned against the back of the old spindle-legged sofa. Its worn springs creaked and its bristly horsehair pricked her hands. The thought shot through her brain: "What am I doing here? How does it concern me?"
He glided meanwhile, listening hard, from door to door.
"If old Leichtweg happened to be in the next room," he said, "there'd be the devil to pay. But if you go away at once by the front entrance into the yard, it might be supposed you only came to ask a question, and we may still save the situation."
She saw in this proposed move nothing but a crafty attempt at evasion, and a fresh volume of wrath overwhelmed her.