Enid glanced at him fearfully. "No! No!" she said, sharply. "I—saw nothing strange. He was the Prophet."
Bale-Corphew's face relaxed.
"Ah!" he said, slowly. "I believe you. But, if you were blind, I saw." He paused and passed his handkerchief over his face. Cold as the day was, drops of perspiration stood upon his forehead.
"I saw. And from that hour the man was lost."
"Lost?"
"Yes, lost." He laughed excitedly; and to Enid the laugh sounded singularly unpleasant, sharp, and cruel. "From that day we have watched him—we, the Six. We have watched him and his friend—the dog who has dared to desecrate the name of Precursor. We have watched them night and day; we have seen them, listened to them hour after hour, while they believed themselves unobserved—?"
"And what do you know? What have you learned?" There was a strange faintness in the tone of her voice.
"Everything. Only yesterday we touched the key-stone of their scheme. To-night—this very night—they have planned an escape. They will attend as usual in the Place; they will fool us as they have fooled us before; and then, when the house is quiet—when the Six are at rest, exhausted by prayer and meditation—they will accomplish their vile work. They will plunder the Treasury of the Unseen!"
"Oh no! No!" With a swift movement she turned to him.
He looked at her for an instant, of silence, and then again the unpleasant, excited laugh escaped him.