"Where did she keep her jewels! Quick! Take the pencil and write," said Wethermill, holding her left wrist.
Vauquier thrust the pencil into her right hand, and awkwardly and slowly her gloved fingers moved across the page.
"I do not know," she wrote; and, with an oath, Wethermill snatched the paper up, tore it into pieces, and threw it down.
"You have got to know," he said, his face purple with passion, and he flung out his arm as though he would dash his fist into her face. But as he stood with his arm poised there came a singular change upon his face.
"Did you hear anything?" he asked in a whisper.
All listened, and all heard in the quiet of the night a faint click, and after an interval they heard it again, and after another but shorter interval yet once more.
"That’s the gate," said Wethermill in a whisper of fear, and a pulse of hope stirred within Celia.
He seized her wrists, crushed them together behind her, and swiftly fastened them once more. Adele Rossignol sat down upon the floor, took the girl’s feet upon her lap, and quietly wrenched off her shoes.
"The light," cried Wethermill in an agonised voice, and Helena Vauquier flew across the room and turned it off.
All three stood holding their breath, straining their ears in the dark room. On the hard gravel of the drive outside footsteps became faintly audible, and grew louder and came near. Adele whispered to Vauquier: