For the second time the aspect of the pleasant, comfortable room had altered; the prettiest things in it looked ungraceful, grim, forbidding; its atmosphere—even the air one breathed—was different. What was happening in the room seemed dream-like, grotesque, quite unreal; and this sense of unreality involved one’s perception of the material, unaltered world outside the room. The sounds of music floated towards one as if from an immeasurable distance.
But probably the queer notion of unsubstantiality in surrounding objects was directly caused by the strangeness and oddness of the General’s antics. He was no longer himself; he was a person acting a part—as it would be acted on a brilliantly lighted stage.
“See!” he whispered, as he came creeping back towards the leather bag. “I have manœuvred you into the worst possible position. I have cut you off from escape. That door is locked. This door I guard.”
One could hear one’s heart beating above the far-off ripple of the music.
“Watch me,” said the General. “Never take your eyes off my hands. See! Here are six cartridges—and I put them down, so—on your side of the table.” He stepped back swiftly and cautiously. “See! Here are six cartridges for me—on my side of the table.” And he sprang away, to his old post in front of the drawing-room door. “It is all fair play. I give as good a chance as I take myself. We stand at equal lengths from our ammunition. You follow it all, don’t you? You catch my meaning?”
Mr. Ridsdale, staring at his empty revolver, nodded.
“Very well. Now, if you value your life, prepare to defend it. See! I am going to load.”
The General’s acting was rather good. Deriving stimulus from his natural emotions, he achieved some fine artistic effects. His flushed face, his bent brows, his fierce attitude and swift movements, indicated the determination of implacable wrath.
“‘The coward!’ she wailed. ‘The miserable coward!’” (page 49).