He leant more and more heavily on the young girl’s shoulders, and said to her with sarcastic joy:
“Your eyes are troubled, Dorothy! What a pleasure to see that! There is fear in your eyes—fear. … How beautiful they are, Dorothy! This is indeed the reward of victory—just a look like that, which is full of fear—fear of me. That is worth more than anything. Dorothy, Dorothy, I love you. … Forget you? What folly! If I wish to kiss your lips, it is that I may love you even more … and that you may love me … that you may follow me like a slave and like the mistress of my heart.”
She touched the wall. The man tried to draw her to him. She made an effort to free herself.
“Ah!” he cried in a sudden fury, mauling her. “No resistance, my dear. Give me your lips, at once, do you hear! If not, it’s Montfaucon who’ll pay. Do you want me to swing him round again as I did just now? Come, obey, or I’ll certainly cut across to his cell; and so much the worse for the brat’s head!”
Dorothy was at the end of her forces. Her legs were bending. All her being shuddered with horror at this contact with the ruffian; and at the same time she trembled to repulse him, so great was her fear lest he should at once fling himself on the child.
Her stiff arms began to bend. The man redoubled his efforts to force her to her knees. It was all over. He was nearly at his goal. But at that moment the most unexpected sight caught her eye. Behind him, a few feet away, something was moving, something which passed through the opposite wall. It was the barrel of a rifle leveled at him through the loophole slit.
On the instant she remembered that Saint-Quentin had carried away from the inn an old and useless rifle without cartridges!
She did not make a sign which could draw d’Estreicher’s attention to it. She understood Saint-Quentin’s maneuver. The boy threatened, but he could only threaten. It was for her to contrive the method by which that menace should as soon as d’Estreicher saw it directed against him, have its full effect. It was certain that d’Estreicher would only need a moment to perceive, as Dorothy herself perceived, the rust and the deplorable condition of the weapon, as harmless as a child’s gun.
Quite clearly Dorothy perceived what she had to: to pull herself together, to face the enemy boldly, and to confuse him, were it only for a few seconds, as she had already succeeded in upsetting him by her coolness and self-control. Her safety, the safety of Montfaucon depended on her firmness. In robore fortuna, she thought.
But that thought she unconsciously uttered in a low voice, as one utters a prayer for protection. And at once she felt her adversary’s grip relax. The old motto, on which he had so often reflected, uttered so quietly, at such a moment, by this woman whom he believed to be at bay, disconcerted him. He looked at her closely and was astounded. Never had her beautiful face worn such a serene air. Over the white teeth the lips opened, and the eyes, a moment ago terrified and despairing, now regarded him with the quietest smile.
“What on earth is it?” he cried, beside himself, as he recalled her astounding laughter near the pool at Hillocks Manor. “Are you going to laugh again today?”
“I’m laughing for the same reason: you are lost.”
He tried to take it as a joke:
“Hang it! How?”
“Yes,” she declared. “I told you so from the first moment; and I was right.”
“You’re mad,” he said, shrugging his shoulders.
She noticed that he had grown more respectful, and sure of a victory which rested in her extraordinary coolness and in the absolute similarity of the two scenes, she repeated:
“You are lost. The situation really is the same as at the Manor. There Raoul and the children had gone to seek for help; and of a sudden, when you were the master, the barrel of a gun was leveled at you. Here, it is the same. The three urchins have found men. They are there, as at the Manor with their guns. … You remember? They are here. The barrels of the guns are leveled at you.”
“You l-l-lie!” stammered the ruffian.
“They are there,” she declared in a yet more impressive tone. “I’ve heard my boys’ signal. They haven’t wasted time coming round the tower. They are on the other side of that wall.”
“You lie!” he cried. “What you say is impossible!”
She said, always with the coolness of a person no longer menaced by peril, and with an imperious contempt:
“Turn round! … You’ll see their guns leveled at your breast. At a word from me they fire! Turn round then!”
He shrunk back. He did not wish to obey. But Dorothy’s eyes, blazing, irresistible, stronger than he, compelled him; and yielding to their compulsion, he turned round.
It was the last quarter of the last minute.
With all the force of her being, with a strength of conviction which did not permit the ruffian to think, she commanded:
“Hands up, you blackguard! Or they’ll shoot you like a dog! Hands up! Shoot there! Show no mercy! Shoot! Hands up!”
D’Estreicher saw the rifle. He raised his hands.
Dorothy sprang on him and in a second tore a revolver from his jacket pocket, and aiming at his head, without her heart quickening a beat and with a perfectly steady hand, she said slowly, her eyes gleaming maliciously:
“Idiot! I told you plainly you were lost.”
XVII
The Secret Perishes
The scene had not lasted a minute; and in less than a minute the readjustment had taken place. Defeat was changed to victory.
A precarious victory. Dorothy knew that a man like d’Estreicher would not long remain the dupe of
