MEANWHILE, Alice Lynn, with a pale face and watchful eyes, ran down the gallery that opened into Lady Clancarty’s private apartments; she locked the door at the upper end and thrust the key into her pocket; she ran back to the only other entrance, the door upon the staircase, and there she seated herself upon the upper step, a devoted sentinel, though her heart beat almost to suffocation. If Clancarty were discovered here—here in his wife’s rooms! Alice shook from head to foot; some awful intuition warned her that peril was at hand.
The gallery was long and dim; two tall tapers in the sconces upon the landing cast a soft radiance in a little space, but left deep shadows. The great house was strangely still. Alice sat and listened to the beating of her own heart which seemed louder than the faint sound of voices behind the closed door at her back. So great was her love for Lady Betty that, like Catharine Douglas, she would have thrust her arm into the staples and held the door against a host, but for all that she was frightened. Presently she started and looked down the stairs. She had heard a soft tread below—yes, she was not mistaken; a woman was coming up, the one woman whom she had thought safely out of the house that night, the one she trusted least, Melissa Thurle. At the moment Alice hated her, and set her teeth and waited, but she trembled, too. As for Melissa, she came up softly, a quiet smile on her smooth face, serenity in her shifting eyes; soft, stealthy, feline in every movement. She pretended to be startled when she stumbled upon Alice, who barred the stairs. Melissa pressed her hand to her heart.
“Why, how you frightened me!” she cried; “what is it, Alice?”
“Nothing,” retorted Alice, who was little skilled in subterfuge and only stubbornly determined; “I thought you were gone to your aunt’s.”
“I started,” replied Melissa sweetly, “but ’twas too cold. I came back, and I have a message for Lady Betty from Lord Sunderland.”
“She has a headache,” said Alice; “you can leave the message with me; no one is to disturb her ladyship to-night unless she calls me.”
“Dear, dear!” exclaimed Melissa, undisturbed, however; “this is unusual—but, unhappily, I must see my lady; Lord Sunderland’s orders are explicit. I dare not disobey.”
“I do!” declared Alice stubbornly, though she quaked, for she heard voices again and she knew, by Melissa’s face, that she heard them, too, for a gleam passed over it, swift as the drawing of a knife.
“You are of no consequence,” said the woman firmly; “I will see her,” and she made a sudden spring to set the girl aside.
But Alice was strong, if she was not diplomatic, and she caught her firmly by the waist.