Ste. Marie began to run forward, slipping the pistol out of his pocket and holding it ready in his hand, for his quick ears told him that there was more than one pair of feet coming through the night. He went to where he could command the approach from the house and halted there, but all at once he gave a low cry and started forward again, for he saw that Arthur Benham and Coira O'Hara were running together, and that they were in desperate haste. He called out to them and the girl cried—
"Go to the door in the wall! The door in the wall! Oh, be quick!" He fell into step beside her, and, as they ran, he said—
"You're going with him? You're coming with us?" The girl answered him—
"No! no!" and she sprang to the little low door and began to fit the iron key into the lock. The three men stood about her, and young Arthur Benham drew his breath in great shivering gasps that were like sobs.
"They heard us!" he cried in a whisper. "They're after us. They heard us on the stairs. I—stumbled and fell. For God's sake, Coira, be quick!"
The girl fumbled desperately with the clumsy key, and dropped upon her knees to see the better. Once she said in a whisper: "I can't turn it. It won't turn," and at that Richard Hartley pushed her out of the way and lent his greater strength to the task.
"The girl fumbled desperately with the clumsy key."
A sudden loud cry came from the house, a hoarse screeching cry in a voice which might have been either man's or woman's, but was as mad and as desperate and as horrible in that still night as the screech of a tortured animal—or of a maniac. It came again and again and it was nearer.
"Oh, hurry! hurry!" said the girl. "Can't you be quick? They're coming." And, as she spoke, the little group about the wall heard the engine of the motor-car outside start up with a staccato roar, and knew that the faithful chauffeur was ready for them.