Was he, I wondered, in the room at all? So far, since eight o’clock, I had not been able to detect the slightest sound from within the chamber. For longer and longer periods I listened with my ear to the door, all senses alert. I thought of knocking, but refrained, for Aire had counselled against it. But that inhuman stillness inside the room!
Suddenly footsteps resounded crossing the floor, no secret footsteps, but blatant and decisive ones. I had hardly time to draw back a little from the entrance when the door opened and Maryvale stood on the threshold.
I was shocked, for with the exception of two days’ bristle he looked so much himself. When he saw me, he tossed his head back in a laugh that had the natural ring.
“Ah, you, Mr. Bannerlee. I wondered which of the gentlemen was protecting me this morning.”
Yes, he seemed quite the same as when I had first met him and we paced the walk outside the Hall of the Moth. Quiet and courteous, sane and substantial, he smiled on my embarrassment.
“Aren’t you coming in? You’ve had a long wait.”
I was trying to meet his cheerful eye and to think at the same time. “I should rather expect you’d wish to come out.”
“No, thank you; I have been out.”
“You have? No one told me.”
“Of course not,” he said with his fluent ease of manner. “Last night my oils weren’t quite right, and I looked for some common varnish in the stable supply room.”