! what am I saying?" he
added wildly.

"Pray, pray delay not!" said the girl, clasping her hands.

"No, no, I come--first to the watch-house, and then to your house, did
you say?" And with a great effort, but almost without taking his eyes
from the child's face, Dormeur strode to a closet beside the window, and
took down a sword, which he drew quickly from the scabbard.

Sara feared him, and retreated to the door.

"What!" he said; "dost think I'd harm thee, little one? Come, take my
hand. Tell me, how did you get in?"

"I found the street-door unfastened, and knocked, but could make no one
hear; then I came in and listened, and there was a light up here, and so
I came and knocked, not knowing what to do; but there is some one there
now--hark!"

"'Tis the servants come back, child," said Anton; but he trod softly for
all that, and, turning about, traversed noiselessly the long winding
passage that led towards the back of the house.

At the end of that passage the well stair-case sent a cold gray gleam
from the skylight in the roof, but down at the basement, where the lobby
opened in the yard, there was a stronger light--the light of a lantern,
by which a man stood impatiently examining a key, and picking it with a
penknife, as though it had been clogged.

"I wanted to unlock that closet too," he muttered, "for I would swear he
keeps gold there, but the cart will be here directly. It's rare luck
that he should be out, and the women too as I verily believe, for not a
soul is stirring in the kitchen. Fancy leaving the house alone! I was a
fool not to take the chance before."

The sound of wheels aroused him, and Bashley--for it was he--gave a
half-frightened glance behind him, for he had suddenly become conscious
that he was talking to himself. He looked upwards also, as though by
some strange instinct; and there, leaning over the wooden balustrade of
the "well," their faces lighted in the gleam of his lantern, were Anton
Dormeur and Sara Rondeau, looking down upon him.

He made a dash at the door leading to the yard, then suddenly turned
and, with a desperate oath, drew a pistol and fired it from the stairs;
but his aim was uncertain, and the ball went straight upward crashing
through the skylight. Another moment, and a door clanged open, a
torrent of air rushed up the well, and amidst shouts and cries, and the
sound of falling glass, Bashley was smitten down, and handcuffed between
two officers, who had been