“Then how could that cursed girl have found out about the Thug business?” exclaimed John.
There was no reply.
“She’s a deep one,” said John, “d—d deep—deeper than I ever thought. I always said she was plucky—cursed plucky—but now I see she’s deep too—and I begin to have my doubts about the way she ought to be took down.”
“I never could make her out,” said Potts. “And now I don’t even begin to understand how she could know that which only we have known. Do you think, Clark, that the devil could have told her of it?”
“Yes,” said Clark. “Nobody but the devil could have told her that, and my belief is that she’s the devil himself. She’s the only person I ever felt afraid of. D—n it, I can’t look her in the face.”
Beatrice retreated and passed across to the opposite wall. She did not wish to see or hear more. She glided by. She was not noticed. She heard John’s voice—sharp and clear—
“We’ll have to begin to-morrow and take her down—that’s a fact.” This was followed by silence.
Beatrice reached the door. She turned the knob. Oh, joy! it was not locked. It opened.
Noiselessly she passed through; noiselessly she shut it behind her. She was outside. She was free.
The moon shone brightly. It illumined the lawn in front and the tops of the clumps of trees whose dark foliage rose before her. She saw all this; yet, in her eagerness to escape, she saw nothing more, but sped away swiftly down the steps, across the lawn, and under the shade of the trees.