"Wash your face and put on your clothes as fast as you can. Every moment is of consequence," said Christabel.
She would explain nothing. Jessie urged her to take off her wet cloak, to go and change her gown and shoes; but she refused with angry impatience.
"There will be time enough for that afterwards," she said; "what I have to do will not take long, but it must be done at once. Pray be quick."
Jessie struggled through her hurried toilet, and followed Christabel along the corridor, without question or exclamation. They went to the door of Baron de Cazalet's room. A light shone under the bottom of the door, and there was the sound of some one stirring within. Christabel knocked, and the door was opened almost instantly by the Baron himself.
"Is it the trap?" he asked. "It's an hour too soon."
"No, it is I, Monsieur de Cazalet. May I come in for a few minutes? I have something to tell you."
"Christabel—my——" He stopped in the midst of that eager exclamation, at sight of the other figure in the background.
He was dressed for the day—carefully dressed, like a man who in a crisis of his life wishes to appear at no disadvantage. His pistol-case stood ready on the table. A pair of candles, burnt low in the sockets of the old silver candlesticks, and a heap of charred and torn paper in the fender showed that the Baron had been getting rid of superfluous documents. Christabel went into the room, followed by Jessie, the Baron staring at them both, in blank amazement. He drew an armchair near the expiring fire, and Christabel sank into it, exhausted and half fainting.
"What does it all mean?" asked de Cazalet, looking at Jessie, "and why are you here with her?"
"Why is she here?" asked Jessie. "There can be no reason except——"