She flew to the door, but it was locked, the key in Whiting’s pocket, or the spring catch holding it, she didn’t know which. She pounded on the door, with her soft hands, but made little commotion that way.
“Useless, my dear,” Whiting said, calmly. “These rooms are on a wing containing but few guests. Nobody will hear you. Pound away, if you like.”
This wasn’t true; as a matter of fact, Whiting was very much afraid somebody would hear her, but he deemed this the best way to stop her,—and it was.
Elsie believed him and quit pounding. Nor did she scream. An idea had come to her. Whiting had said rooms. Therefore there was more to the suite than the one they were in. Covertly she glanced at the doors, and decided that while one rather narrow one was doubtless a closet, the wide one, the other side of the room, probably opened into an adjoining room, which was likely to give on the hall.
At any rate, it was worth trying.
Cleverly, she seemed not to be noticing these details, but sat, her handkerchief to her eyes, apparently subdued and dismayed. And, in fact she was both, but not to the point of surrender, as she appeared to Whiting’s anxious watchfulness.
Cautiously looking about, with seemingly a vacant stare, she saw many little personal belongings, that convinced her the room was Whiting’s sitting room. Doubtless the next was his bedroom. All the same, she determined to dash through it in an attempt at freedom. If she were quick, and the other hall door not locked, she could get to the hall,—while if she were trapped in the other room, her plight would be no worse than it was at present.
She rose and walked disconsolately about,—looked from the windows, stared, unseeing, at a picture on the wall,—and generally appeared to be aimlessly wandering, while she thought matters over.
Whiting watched her, but so cannily did Elsie mislead his thoughts, that he didn’t notice she drew nearer and nearer the bedroom door.
At last, she was almost against it, her eyes fastened on a small clock which stood on a table at the opposite side of the room.