The women shivering
in the darkness about her would fain have struck a light and drawn her
back into the room, for they felt safer there. But she was not to be
moved. The laughter and chatter of the men in the guard-room, the coming
and going of Bigot as he passed, below but out of sight, had no terrors
for her; nay, she breathed more freely on the bare open landing of the
staircase than in the close confines of a room which her fears made
hateful to her. Here at least she could listen, her face unseen; and
listening she bore the suspense more easily.
A turn in the staircase, with the noise which proceeded from the guard-
room, rendered it difficult to hear what happened in the closed room
below. But she thought that if an alarm were raised there she must hear
it; and as the moments passed and nothing happened, she began to feel
confident that her lover had made good his escape by the window.
Presently she got a fright. Three or four men came from the guard-room
and went, as it seemed to her, to the door of the room with the shattered
casement. She told herself that she had rejoiced too soon, and her heart
stood still. She waited for a rush of feet, a cry, a struggle. But
except an uncertain muffled sound which lasted for some minutes, and was
followed by a dull shock, she heard nothing more.
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