“That’s easy said!” Hornyold answered with a poor attempt at defiance. “Easy! What! Are we to have all this fuss about a chit that——”
“Silence, sir!” And Clyne’s voice rang so loud that the other not only obeyed but stepped back, as if he feared a blow. “Silence, sir! I know you well enough, and your past, to know that you cannot afford a scandal. And you know me! I advise you, therefore, when you have passed that door”—he pointed to the door leading to the prison lodge, “to keep a still tongue, and to treat this lady’s name with respect. If not for the sake of your own character, for the sake, at any rate, of your ill-earned stipends.”
“Fine words!” Hornyold muttered, with a sneer of bravado.
“I will make them good,” Clyne answered. And the look and the tone were such that the other, high as he wished to carry it, thought discretion the better part. He turned, still sneering, on his heel, and cutting the air with his whip made his way with what dignity he might to the door. He hesitated an instant and then disappeared, raging inwardly.
The moment he was gone Clyne’s face relaxed. He passed his hand over his brow as if to recall his thoughts, and he sighed deeply. Then turning he went slowly to Henrietta’s door and tapped on it. The girl opened. “May I speak to you?” he said.
She did not answer, but she stepped out. She had recovered her self-control—quickly and completely, as women do; and her face told nothing. Whatever she thought of his intervention and of the manner in which he had routed Hornyold, she made no sign. She waited for him to speak. Yet she was aware not only of his downcast carriage, but of the change which sleepless nights and days of unutterable suspense had wrought in his face. His features were thinner and sharper, his temples more hollow: and there was a listening, hungry look in his eyes which did not quit them even when he dealt with other things than his loss.
“I have brought an order for your release,” he said without an attempt at preface. “I have given bail for your appearance when needed. You are free to go. You have not to thank me, however, but Mr. Sutton, who discovered the letter that was written to you——”
She interrupted him by an exclamation.
“The letter,” he continued mechanically, “that was written to you making an appointment.”
“Impossible!” she cried. “I destroyed it.”