At The Villa Rose

They stood in the darkness listening. But not a sound came from

behind the door. Was this room empty, too? In each one's mind was

the fear that the birds had flown. Lemerre carefully took the

handle of the door and turned it. Very slowly and cautiously he

opened the door. A strong light beat out through the widening gap

upon his face. And then, though his feet did not move, his

shoulders and his face drew back. The action was significant

enough. This room, at all events, was not empty. But of what

Lemerre saw in the room his face gave no hint. He opened the door

wider, and now Hanaud saw. Ricardo, trembling with excitement,

watched him. But again there was no expression of surprise,

consternation, or delight. He stood stolidly and watched. Then he

turned to Ricardo, placed a finger on his lips, and made room.

Ricardo crept on tiptoe to his side. And now he too could look in.

He saw a brightly lit bedroom with a made bed. On his left were

the shuttered windows overlooking the lake. On his right in the

partition wall a door stood open. Through the door he could see a

dark, windowless closet, with a small bed from which the

bedclothes hung and trailed upon the floor, as though some one had

been but now roughly dragged from it. On a table, close by the

door, lay a big green hat with a brown ostrich feather, and a

white cloak. But the amazing spectacle which kept him riveted was

just in front of him. An old hag of a woman was sitting in a chair

with her back towards them. She was mending with a big needle the

holes in an old sack, and while she bent over her work she crooned

to herself some French song. Every now and then she raised her

eyes, for in front of her, under her charge, Mlle. Celie, the girl

of whom Hanaud was in search, lay helpless upon a sofa. The train

of her delicate green frock swept the floor. She was dressed as

Helene Vauquier had described. Her gloved hands were tightly bound

behind her back, her feet were crossed so that she could not have

stood, and her ankles were cruelly strapped together. Over her

face and eyes a piece of coarse sacking was stretched like a mask,

and the ends were roughly sewn together at the back of her head.

She lay so still that, but for the labouring of her bosom and a

tremor which now and again shook her limbs, the watchers would

have thought her dead. She made no struggle of resistance; she lay

quiet and still. Once she writhed, but it was with the uneasiness

of one in pain, and the moment she stirred the old woman's hand

went out to a bright aluminium flask which stood on a little table

at her side.