I glanced toward the corner of the room where the safe stood, reliquary of a worthless thing for which much blood had been spilled.
Then sounded footsteps along the avenue, and my fear whispered that they were not those of Bristol but of one who had murdered him, and who came guilefully, to murder me!
I snatched the revolver from my pocket and crossed the darkened room. Just to the right of one of the French windows I stood looking out across the loggia to the end of the avenue. The night was a bright one, and the room was flooded with a reflected mystic light, but outside the moon paved the avenue with pearl, and through the trees I saw a figure approaching.
Was it Bristol? It had his build, it had his gait; but my fears remained. Then the figure crossed the patch of shrubbery and stepped on to the loggia.
"Mr. Cavanagh!"
I laughed dryly at my own cowardice, but my heart was still beating abnormally.
"Here I am, Bristol, in a ghastly funk!"
"I don't wonder! They may be on us any time now. All's well at the gate, but Morris says he heard, or thought he heard something at the side of the chapel opposite, a while ago."
"Wind in the bushes?"
"It may have been; but he says there was no breeze at the time."