Fay turned her bloodless face towards him, and her eyes never left him. She felt Michael listening behind the screen.
"There was hardly an instant," continued the official, with a touch of professional pride, "before the alarm was given. By a fortunate chance I myself happened to be near. The garden was instantly surrounded. It is being searched now. It seems hardly possible that the assassin can have escaped. I entreat your pardon for intruding this painful subject on the sensitive mind of a lady, and breaking in on your privacy."
"I should think he has escaped by now," said Fay hoarsely.
"It is possible, but improbable," said the official. Then he turned to the duke. "This is, I understand from you, the only way into the house from the garden?"
"The only way that might possibly still be open," said the duke. "The doors on the ground floor are both locked, as we have seen."
"We greatly feared," continued the duke, turning to his wife, "that the murderer if he were still in the garden, finding it was being searched, might terrify you by rushing in here."
"No one has been in here," said Fay automatically.
"Have you been in this room ever since you left the saloon?" said her husband.
"Yes. I have been reading here ever since."
"Then it is impossible that anyone should have escaped into the house through this room," said the duke. "The duchess must have seen him. It is no longer necessary to search the house."