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At the Trente et Quarante table, as well, Durkin had watched the last thousand-franc note of the Princess wither away. "And this, my dear, will mean another three months with my sweet old palsied Duc de la Houspignolle," she had laughingly yet bitterly exclaimed, in excellent English, to the impassive young Oxford man who was then dogging her heels.
He had caught her by the arm, but now he released his grip and turned away. "Quick," she whispered, "here's somebody coming!" She was struggling with the ends of her veil, and Durkin was aimlessly pacing away from her, when the hurrying steward brushed by them.
But as he secured the cover with its chainlock, and dropped down into the tunnel below, the reports seemed thin and muffled and far away to Durkin. A moment later, however, he heard the ominous and vibrant echo of the officer's night-stick, on the asphalt, frenziedly rapping for assistance.
MacNutt softly opened a door on the right, and, after listening for a cautious moment or two, as softly entered the room into which this door led. And still again a key was turned and withdrawn from the lock. Even with his eyes closed Durkin, as he lay there husbanding his strength, was conscious of the sudden light that flooded the room.
"I don't see why we should be afraid of either Palermo or Gibraltar," Durkin went on at last, with a half-impatient business-is-business glance about him. "Keenan is alone in this. He has no agents over here, that we know of, and he daren't put anything in the hands of the authorities.
Durkin replaced the covering, noiselessly, and feeling to right and left with his outstretched hands, crept inward through the narrow tunnel in which he found himself. His fingers came in touch with the chilly surface of a steel-faced door.
As they sped on, and his wife pointed out to him that the selfsame road they were taking between confining rock and sea was the same narrow passage, so time-worn and war-scarred, once taken by Greeks and Ligurians, Romans and Saracens, it seemed to Durkin that his first fine estimate of the life of war and adventure had been a false one. His old besetting doubts and scruples began to awake.
That was an awful punch you gave him, Durkin." "Yes, he can't fight," replied Penny unemotionally, as he helped carry the burden to the bed. "He'll be all right in a minute. I jabbed him under the ear. It doesn't hurt you much; just gives you a sort of a headache. Wet a towel and dab it on his face." "What the dickens was it all about, anyway?" asked Clint as he followed instructions.
"The floor above," slowly responded the other, "is Richard Penfield's private offices, where his safe is, and where your friend, no doubt, is now depositing his valuables, behind a burglar-proof time-lock!" "Oh, that's it, is it!" cried Durkin. He turned to the woman sharply. "Frank, quick! Leave Keenan to me!" "Yes!" she answered, with coerced attention. "MacNutt must not get out of this house!
It appeared to stop only for a moment, but in that moment two men leaped from the wide-swung tonneau door. When they clambered into it once more Durkin saw that Frank was between them. And one of the men was MacNutt, and the other Keenan.
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