"Yes, to find my poor father. The dear old man was wrecked in coming here, and my husband sent men to find him, but they blundered and came back empty-handed, and not a half an hour ago he went off himself."
"Was he riding?" said Jason; but without waiting for an answer he made towards the door.
"Wait! Where are you going?" cried Greeba.
Swift as lightning the thought had flashed though her mind, "What if he should follow him!"
Now the door to the room was a heavy, double-hung door of antique build, and at the next instant she had leaped to it and shot the heavy wooden [bar] that bolted it.
At that he laid one powerful hand on the bar itself, and wrenched it outward across the leverage of its iron loops, and it cracked and broke, and fell to the ground in splinters.
Then her strong excitement lent the brave girl strength, and her fear for her husband gave her courage, and crying, "Stop, for heaven's sake stop," she put her back to the door, tore up the sleeve of her dress, and thrust her bare right arm through the loops where the bar had been.
"Now," she cried, "you must break my arm after it."
"God forbid," said Jason, and he fell back for a moment at that sight. But, recovering himself, he said, "Greeba, I would not touch your beautiful arm to hurt it; no, not for all the wealth of the world. But I must go, so let me pass."
Still her terror was centred on the thought of Jason's vengeance.