Prisoners: Fast Bound In Misery And Iron. Mary Cholmondeley

      Fay turned her bloodless face towards him, and her eyes never left him. She felt Michael listening behind the screen.

      "There was hardly an instant," continued the official, with a touch of professional pride, "before the alarm was given. By a fortunate chance I myself happened to be near. The garden was instantly surrounded. It is being searched now. It seems hardly possible that the assassin can have escaped. I entreat your pardon for intruding this painful subject on the sensitive mind of a lady, and breaking in on your privacy."

      "I should think he has escaped by now," said Fay hoarsely.

      "It is possible, but improbable," said the official. Then he turned to the duke. "This is, I understand from you, the only way into the house from the garden?"

      "The only way that might possibly still be open," said the duke. "The doors on the ground floor are both locked, as we have seen."

      "We greatly feared," continued the duke, turning to his wife, "that the murderer if he were still in the garden, finding it was being searched, might terrify you by rushing in here."

      "No one has been in here," said Fay automatically.

      "Have you been in this room ever since you left the saloon?" said her husband.

      "Yes. I have been reading here ever since."

      "Then it is impossible that anyone should have escaped into the house through this room," said the duke. "The duchess must have seen him. It is no longer necessary to search the house."

      The delegato hesitated. He opened the glass door and spoke to the men with the lantern.

      "They are convinced that it is not possible he is concealed in the garden," he said. "Perhaps if the duchess were deeply engaged in study he might have serpentinely glided through into the next room without her perceiving him. It is, I understand, the duchess's private apartment. It might be as well—where does the duchess's apartment lead into?"

      "Into my rooms," said the duke, "and my dog is there. He would have given the alarm long ago if any stranger had passed through my room. If he is silent no one has been near him."

      There was a pause.

      Fay learned what suspense means.

      The delegato twirled his moustaches.

      He was evidently reluctant to give up the remotest chance, and yet reluctant to inconvenience the duke further.

      "It is just possible," he said, "that the assassin may have taken refuge in here before the duchess came back to her apartment. My duties are grave, duchess. Have I your permission?"

      Fay bowed.

      The duke, still urbane, but evidently finding the situation unduly prolonged, led the way into Fay's bedroom.

      This story would never have been written if Lord John had not remained standing in the doorway.

      Did Michael know he was there? He had not so far spoken, or given any sign of his presence.

      "Won't you go into my room, Lord John, and help in the capture," she said distinctly; and as she spoke she was aware that she was only just in time.

      But Lord John would not go in, thanks. Lord John preferred to advance heavily in her direction, and to sit down by her on the couch, telling her not to look so terrified, that he would take care of her.

      She stared wildly at him, livid and helpless.

      A door was softly opened, and was instantly followed by the furious barking of a dog.

      "Go and help them," said Fay to Lord John.

      But Lord John did not move. Like all bores he was conscious of his own attractive personality. He only settled his eyeglass more firmly in his pale eye.

      "You never spoke to me all evening," he said, with jocular emphasis. "What have I done to deserve such severity?"

      In another moment the duke and the official returned, followed by Sancho, a large Bridlington terrier, still bristling and snarling at the official.

      Fay called the dog to her, and held it forcibly, pretending to caress it.

      "No one has gone by that way," said the delegato to the duke. "The dog proves that."

      "Sancho proves it," said the duke gravely.

      As he spoke he paused as if suddenly arrested. His eyes were fixed on a small Florentine mirror which hung over Fay's writing-table in the angle of the wall. The duke's face changed, as a man's face might change, who, conscious of no enemy, feels himself stabbed from behind in the dark. Then he came forward, and said with a firm voice:

      "We will now go once more into the gardens. Lord John, you will accompany us."

      Lord John got heavily to his feet.

      "Take Sancho with you," said Fay, holding the dog with difficulty, who was obviously excited and suspicious, its mobile nostrils working, its eyes glued to the screen.

      The duke opened the glass door, and Sancho, his attention turned, rushed out into the night, barking furiously.

      "You need have no further fear," said the duke to Fay, looking into her eyes. "The assassin has certainly escaped."

      "No doubt," said Fay.

      "Unless he is hiding behind the screen all the time," said Lord John, with his customary facetiousness. "It is about the only place in the room he could hide in, except of course the wastepaper basket."

      The delegato, who was not apparently a man who quickly seized the humorous side of a remark, at once stepped back from the window, and glanced at the wastepaper basket.

      "I may as well look behind the screen," he said, and went towards it.

      But before he could reach it the screen moved, and Michael came out from behind it.

      The four people in the room gazed at him spell-bound, speechless; Lord John reeled against the wall. The duke alone retained his self-possession.

      Michael advanced into the middle of the room, and for a moment his eyes met Fay's. Who shall say what he read in their terror-stricken depths?

      Then he turned to the duke and said:

      "I ask pardon of you, duke, and of the duchess, my cousin, for the inconvenience I have caused you. I confess to the murder of the Marchese di Maltagliala, and sought refuge in the garden. When the garden was surrounded I sought refuge here. I did not tell the duchess what I had done, but I implored her to let me take shelter here, and to promise not to give me up. She ought at once to have given me up. She yielded to the dictates of humanity and suffered me to hide in this room. Duchess, I thank you for your noble, your self-sacrificing but unavailing desire to shield a guilty man."

      Michael went up to her, took her cold hand and kissed it. Then he turned again to the