The danger passed and once more the crowd was full of amused wonder as the official glaring around, suddenly pounces upon the wife’s sedan. Encouraged and jeered on by the crowd’s boisterous hoots, he reached in and grabbed the wife by the arm, but as she rose out of her sedan his hand fell.
The crowd became as still as solitude itself—a silence of swaying lanterns and glare of torch. For a long time in this perfect stillness the mob looked breathlessly upon her, then there went over them a soft whispering sound that might have been a sigh. At this sound the officer, who had fallen back astonished, muttered so that those around him heard:
“Tai Lin’s wife.”
As he spoke she tossed her head disdainfully, reaching out her hand to the Breton, who stood bewildered beside her, taking hold of his arm and with calm, scornful hauteur shining in her eyes, she walked slowly past the officer. The mob fell back as she approached, leaving a lane through their centre, and at the end of this terrible passage of lights and faces Tsang joined them. Seizing the arm of the Breton he whispered:
“Hurry!”
A short distance down the street he led them into a doorway, passed up some steps along a black corridor; down other steps, into a court, across this through another passage, thence out into a street. As they gained this thoroughfare they heard a dull cry:
“A priest has stolen Tai Lin’s wife!”
“Kill him!”
“Close the gates!”
“We must run,” cried Tsang.