In this primitive, but none the less potent, way had the Spaniard made himself, in one sense at least, master of the situation—the old eternal situation between the man pursuing and the woman fleeing.
Caring little whether she was now seen or not, Mrs. Mote pressed her face closely to the glass pane. She looked at the lithe sinewy figure of Penelope's companion with a curiously altered feeling; a great sinking of the heart had taken the place of the pity and contempt of only a moment before.
For awhile neither Penelope nor Don José saw the face behind the door. Mrs. Robinson had turned away, and had begun walking slowly round the domed hall, her companion following her, but keeping his distance. At last, when passing for the second time the open door leading to the darkened room beyond, she had looked up, uttered an exclamation of angry disgust, and had slackened her footsteps, while he, quickening his, had decreased the space between them....
When, in later life, Penelope unwillingly recalled the scene, her memory preferred to dwell on the grotesque rather than on the sinister side of the episode. But at the moment of ordeal—ah, then her whole being became very literally absorbed in supplication to the dead two who when living had never failed her: her father and Melancthon Robinson.
They may have been permitted to respond, or perhaps a more explicable cause may have brought about a revival of pride and good feeling in the Spanish gentleman; for when there came release it seemed as if Mrs. Mote was the unwitting dea ex machina.
The two, moving within panther and doe wise, both saw, simultaneously, the plain, homely face of Mrs. Robinson's old nurse staring in upon them, and the sight, affording the woman infinite comfort and courage, seemed to withdraw all power from the man, for very slowly, with apparent reluctance, Don José Moricada turned on his heel, and unlocked the door.
The maid did not reply to the rebuke, uttered in a low tone, 'Oh, Motey, we've been waiting for you such a long time.' Instead, she turned to the Spaniard. 'My lady is tired, sir. Surely you've showed her enough by now.'
He bent his head, silently opening again the glazed door and waiting for them to pass through, as his only answer.
But Penelope's nerve had gone. She was clutching her old nurse's arm with desperate tightening fingers. 'I can't go through there, Motey, unless'—she spoke almost inaudibly—'unless you can make him walk through first.'
Mrs. Mote was quite equal to the occasion. 'Will you please go on, sir? My mistress is nervous of the dark passage.'