Therefore, taking care that neither should his knees crack nor any other sound whatever be made by him, he rose to his feet. Then, he put his hand to the side of the laths to be ready to thrust them aside and follow her. But, perhaps, because that hand was not as steady as it should have been, those laths rattled the slightest. Had she heard? No! He knew that could not be, since now he heard the rattling of others--of those belonging to his own room. Those would drown the lesser noise that he had made--those----
He paused in his reflections, amazed. Down where his room was to the right he heard a sound greater than any which could be caused by the gentle pushing aside of a Venetian blind--he heard a smothered cry, and also something that resembled a person stumbling forward, falling!
Then in a moment he recollected. He knew what had happened. He had forgotten to remove the cord he had stretched across the window at midday ere he slept. He had left it there, and she had fallen forward over it.
In a moment he was, himself, on the veranda and outside the window of his own darkened room. In another he was in that room, had struck a match, and saw her--shrouded, hooded to the eyes--over by the door opening on to the corridor and endeavouring to unfasten it. He noticed, too, that one arm, above the wrist, was bandaged. But she was too late. He had caught her now.
"So," he said, "I know who my visitor is at last, Madame Carmaux. And I think I know your object here. Have you not dropped another phial in your fall and broken it? The room is full of the hateful odour of the Amancay poison."
She made him no answer, so that he felt sure she was determined not to let him hear her voice, but he felt that she was trembling all over, even as she writhed in his grasp, endeavouring to avoid it. Then, knowing that words were unnecessary, he opened the door into the corridor and bade her go forth.
"You know this house well and can find your way easily in the dark. Meanwhile, I am now going to descend to have an explanation with the master of Desolada."
[CHAPTER XXVI.]
"YOU HAVE KILLED HIM!"
Before however, Julian descended to confront Sebastian he thought it was necessary to do two things; first, to light the lamp to see how much of that accursed Amancay had been spilt by the broken phial, and next--which was the more important--to recharge and look to his revolver. For he thought it very likely that after he had said all he intended to say to Sebastian, he might find the weapon useful.