"For myself," said Crispin. "I think it is a very nice house, and I am quite sorry that we are leaving it to-day. That is, some of us—not all," he added, softly.
"If you are going to murder us," Dunbar cried, "get done with it. We don't fear you, you know, whatever colour your hair may be. But whether you murder us or no I can tell you one thing, that your own time has come—not many more hours of liberty for you."
"All the more reason to make the most of those I have got," said Crispin. "Murder you? No. But you have fallen in very opportunely for the testing of certain theories of mine. I look forward to a very interesting hour or two. It is now just four o'clock. We leave this house at eight—or, at least, some of us do. I can promise all of us a very interesting four hours with no time for sleep at all. I have no doubt you are all tired, wandering about in the fog for so long must be fatiguing, but I don't see any of you sleeping—not for an hour or two, at least."
Hesther said then: "Mr. Crispin, I believe that I am chiefly concerned in this. If I promise to go quietly with you abroad I hope that you will free these two gentlemen. I give you that promise and I shall keep it."
"No, no," Dunbar cried, springing forward. "You shan't go with him anywhere, Hesther, by heaven you shan't. Not while there's any breath in my body——"
"And when there isn't any breath in your body, Mr. Dunbar," said Crispin, "what then?"
"A very good line for an Adelphi melodrama, Mr. Crispin," said Harkness, "but it seems to me that we've stayed here talking long enough. I warn you that I am an American citizen, and I am not to be kept here against my will——"
"Aren't you indeed, Mr. Harkness?" said Crispin. "Well, that's a line of Adelphi drama, if you like. How many times in a secret service play has the hero declared that he's an American citizen? Which only goes to show, I suppose, how near real life is to the theatre—or rather how much more theatrical real life is than the theatre can ever hope to be. But you're all right, Mr. Harkness—I won't forget that you're an American citizen. You shall have special privileges. That I promise you."
Dunbar then did a foolish thing. He made a dash for the farther end of the hall. What he had in mind no one knows—in all probability to find a window, hurl himself through it and escape to give the alarm. But the alarm to whom? That was, as far as things had yet gone, the foolishness of their position. A policeman arriving at the house would find nothing out of order, only that there two gentlemen had broken in, barbarously, at a midnight hour to abscond with the married lady of the family.
Dunbar's effort was foolish in any case; its issue was that, in a moment of time, without noise or a word spoken, the two Japanese servants had him held, one hand on either arm. He looked stupid enough, there in the middle of the hall, his eyes dim with tears of rage, his body straining ineffectively against that apparently light and casual hold.