"Left you!"
"I knew, of course, why . . . It was when the papers were revelling in the sensational 'return'—as they called it—of the Lone Wolf. I had tried to keep it from you, fearing the consequences of the excitement, in your condition; but the hue and cry was out for you, I was at my wits' ends to hide you away from the police, it was necessary to tell you why . . . What I had so feared happened: you brooded incessantly, whenever your mental condition made you forget the affair for a time—as when you'd wake up from a sound night's sleep remembering nothing of the previous day—something was sure to happen to remind you. A hundred times you begged me to let you go, that you might find and expose the scoundrel who was masquerading in your reputation; I knew you were incompetent for that, at the time, and always managed somehow to talk you out of it, until—as I say—abruptly, without word or sign, you left me."
"Left you!"
"Ah! but you don't know." Her smile grew gently arch, fondly teasing. "Don't you, my Michael! even remember—"
She gave a startled movement, averting her attention to the windows, her body became tense in his embrace, her hands convulsively tightened upon his shoulders.
The veranda was booming with a sudden, concerted rush of many feet. Lanyard offered to release the woman, but she clung to him as if in terror; and at the last he had to use his strength, because he foresaw what was to befall, forcibly breaking her hold and throwing her from him lest she share a peril that, he was resolved, must at any cost be his alone.
Crying out, not loudly but in protest and solicitude for him, she staggered back; and Lanyard turned toward the desk to retrieve his pistol—too late. Already a man was shouldering in through the broken window. He brought up standing with an automatic trained on Lanyard.
"Stick 'em up, my man!" he rumbled—"and be quick about it."
Lanyard was quick about it. His own weapon lay on the far edge of the desk, at least eight feet away; before he could have covered half that distance a bullet would have stopped him. Hands level with his ears, he swung slowly to face Morphew.
Gross, ungainly, panting, rocking from one to the other of his heavily planted feet, the Sultan of Loot stood with head slightly lowered and thrust forward, face of a pig hideously twisted by a leer of malice successful and exultant.