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At last, about half-past eight o'clock, she heard a heavy, uncertain footfall on the stairs. She flew to the door and beheld her son. His clothes were torn and disordered; his cravat was missing, he wore no overcoat, and he was bareheaded. He looked very pale, and his teeth were chattering. His eyes stared vacantly, and his features had an almost idiotic expression.
The two old faces, with the strong features, deep wrinkles, sunken mouths, and bald heads tied up in dazzling white coifs, were in full relief against the dim background. They were as motionless as statues; neither looked up as our footfall struck along the cobbles; it was an exciting moment in the game. Below these old houses stretched the public gardens. Here also there was a great stillness.
The whole chamber was hung round with superb skins, the white fur of the Polar bear predominating; but there were couches cushioned with deep brown seal; and the same glossy skin was laid upon the floor in so many layers that the footfall was noiseless and pleasantly luxuriant. The furniture otherwise was both modern and artistic.
All at once a light, moccasined footfall is heard, and there stepped from the woods an Indian girl, graceful as a fawn, with her head crowned with flowers, and softly singing a strange, sweet song in an unknown tongue. When the stranger was seen she started to flee, but with a smile he beckoned her to stop, which she did, as though hypnotized.
It was still too hot to think of staying indoors, so he lay on some cool dock-leaves, and thought over the past day and its doings, and how very good they all had been. The Rat's light footfall was presently heard approaching over the parched grass. 'O, the blessed coolness! he said, and sat down, gazing thoughtfully into the river, silent and pre-occupied.
In every window of the gable end which faced his hiding-place he fancied an eye watching his movements; in every distant step he heard the footfall of doom coming that way to his discovery. And while he trembled, he had to reflect, to think, to form some plan. In the town was no place for him, and short of the open country no safety. And how could he gain the open country?
His footfall upon the warped board walk which led to the front door snapped through the silence like a pistol shot. "If there's anybody laying for me here he knows now that I've come," he told himself. And with no hesitation now, yet with no lessening of his watchfulness, he came on swiftly until he stood under the pear trees and within ten feet of the front porch.
He smokes again, and looks at the cannel coal as it leaps into flame. The room is very still; not a footfall can be heard in the house; partly because the doors are hung with a view to silence and the floors thickly carpeted, and partly because there are only two servants in-doors, and those men. The cook cannot speak English, and Fred's own man, a jewel in his way, is taciturn to a fault.
Then with her mind still thoroughly unawakened, her heart began suddenly to pitch and lurch like a frightened horse whose rider has not even remotely sensed as yet the approach of an unwonted footfall. "What did you say?" she repeated worriedly. "Just exactly what was it that you said? I guess maybe I didn't understand just exactly what it was that you said."
He listened to the declining footfall of that silent mystery; a whisper floated upwards, a door creaked, no more than that, and yet the effect was wildly disturbing, even to a person of the sang froid of Montaiglon. At a bound he went up to his chamber and lit a candle, and stood a space on the floor, lost in thought.
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