Then for a brief space of time the studio remained deserted, save for the prostrate figure lying motionless upon the couch. A big blue-bottle fly buzzed around the open window, flinging itself at intervals noisily against the glass. From the street without arose the low hum of passing traffic. Otherwise a dull, peaceful silence held sway.
But in the adjoining chamber sat one from whom all peace was far remote. Even as Pallister had darted down the front stairs, Evarne had entered from Langthorne Place and gained the plaster-room. An irresistible force had drawn her back to the vicinity of her lover and her enemy; but still unwilling to make her presence known to them, she had crept softly into the one little room to which access was possible without entering the studio.
As she sat there waiting—waiting for she knew not what—every nerve in her body thrilled painfully. Restless nights and lack of food had rendered her unfitted to cope with the continuous train of cruel, tearing emotions that had fallen to her lot that morning. The gnawing anxiety of the last half-hour had been nigh unendurable. A very few seconds of this further suspense, this acute nerve-strain, and she uttered an audible groan, forced from her lips by both mental and physical distress.
Startled by the sound, she tried to turn her thoughts from the present to all that was most bright in the future.
"So—we are to be married to-morrow. Oh, Geoff, Geoff, my darling!"
But anxiety and apprehension beset her too closely to be avoided. Close upon this blissful reflection followed another.
"Then—after that—not only my dear one's happiness, but my life—my very life—depend upon that vile creature here, to whom nothing is sacred. Am I doing right by Geoff? Oh, if I could only rid myself of these doubts!"
She sighed and twisted her hands together. Then composed herself to thought once more.
"But my mind was fully convinced, my conscience upheld me surely enough until Morris came. Would to Heaven the vessel that brought him to England had sunk to the bottom of the sea, and that he lay silenced forever beneath the waters."
Again she sighed. Again she thought.