Larry Hughes himself treated her with punctilious politeness on the whole, although there were passages in which the mask was lifted and she clashed with his savage and indomitable will. These episodes usually followed a repulsed attempt on his part to make love to her, and she had learned to meet them with a dignified retirement to her room.
She tried to meet her situation gracefully, but there were moments when horror had her by the throat. She was sickened by her own impotence to meet the march of an unknown destiny. Were the police seeking her as a fugitive thief? What was at the back of Larry Hughes’ mind in regard to her? One thing was certain. She could not be held indefinitely as a prisoner in this spot. She contemplated the future with dizzy apprehension.
There came a day when no man moved about the house or grounds. Sophie Lengholm met her inquiries with the grim assurance that they would be back in a little. Penelope knew that she lied. She twisted her brains for some method of using the situation to her advantage. It was a case of woman to woman only. They were alone together, save only for the big Alsatian.
Other things being equal, Penelope knew that in a hand to hand encounter she would have no chance with the elder woman. She moved with apparent aimlessness about the house and grounds seeking for something that might serve as a weapon. At last her eye fell on a short and heavy poker in the dining-room, and she tested its balance and weight critically, although with a little shudder. She knew that if she permitted herself to think she would not have resolution enough to go on with the thing that was in her mind. But it was either that, or an unresisting acquiescence in anything that might befall.
She found Mrs. Lengholm in the kitchen, and making no attempt to conceal the poker which she carried, came straight to the point.
“I want the key of the wall gate,” she said resolutely.
Sophie abandoned the table on which she was kneading dough, and brushed her fingers calmly.
“Why are you carrying that thing?” she asked imperturbably and nodded her head towards the poker which the girl was clutching with tightened fingers.
“You will let me out of this place,” declared Penelope. “I don’t want to hurt you, Mrs. Lengholm, but if you make me use force—” She moved a step towards the other woman.
Sophie’s face set, and she made an angry gesture. “Don’t be an idiot,” she remonstrated. The girl with white face and tightened lips drew another step forward. She was afraid that her resolution might weaken. It was not that she lacked courage, but to strike the other in this way seemed to her like murder. But she told herself that she had to go through with it now.
The older woman retreated, and her lips puckered in a shrill and prolonged whistle. There was the sound of something pounding fiercely along the corridor and Penelope realised her oversight. She had forgotten the dog.
She wheeled abruptly to face the snarling animal and she heard a low chuckle from Mrs. Lengholm. The thing gathered itself for a leap and Penelope flung up her arm to ward off the attack, and instinctively closed her eyes. A sharp command from Sophie checked the dog, and it squatted on its haunches regarding the girl with fierce yellow eyes.
“I don’t blame you,” said Sophie, easily, as moving back to the table she resumed kneading the dough. “In your place I would probably have tried something of the same kind. If I were you I’d go and put that thing back, and settle down. It’ll be easier for you if you are a good girl.”
Penelope’s fingers loosened, and the poker fell with a thud to the floor. There were tears of chagrin in her eyes.
“You go and lie down, and have a nice sleep, now,” went on Sophie with motherly complacency. “You haven’t so much to worry about, anyhow. No need to try and murder the only person about the place of your own sex. If I was gone, things might be so very much worse for you.”
She spoke, as it might be, to a self-willed child. There was no suspicion of resentment in her tone, but rather a tolerant assumption that any outburst by the girl was foredoomed to failure. Penelope dropped into a chair, and her grave grey eyes scrutinised the other with deliberation.
“Where is this going to end?” she asked.
Mrs. Lengholm administered a final punch to the dough before replying. “I don’t know,” she confessed mildly. “Why don’t you ask Mr. Hughes?”
“That snake! Ugh!” Penelope grimaced with conviction.
“He’s got his faults,” admitted Sophie, “but he has a great admiration for you. You could twist him round your little finger if you agreed to marry him. He’s rich, he’s good looking, he’s got culture. You’d be better off than many a princess. I know the man, miss. If he sets his mind on a thing he gets it. He gets it by fair means if he can, but he gets it anyway. I have never known him fail in anything that he set his heart upon. It would be better for you to be dead than to hope to thwart him.”
“I would rather die,” asserted Penelope.
“You think you would. That’s what the girls say in the novels. This is the real thing. You are dealing with a man who will stand at nothing. Believe me or not, Miss Noelson, I have tried to protect you. I can only go so far. If Larry Hughes takes the bit between his teeth—and he will sooner or later—there is nothing that can stop him. Take an older woman’s advice, my dear. Marry him.”
Penelope tilted her head defiantly. She had tried again and again to reach some point of
