nd the door clicked again, slamming in its socket
with the sickening crash of steel against steel; the sound
reverberating hard and metallic like a blow against the eardrum,
finally dying away in the distance, echo upon echo until all was silent.

The girl lay still on the floor where they had left her. She had
swooned, and as she returned to consciousness slowly, gradually, her
breath came in little gasps through her parted lips and she moaned as
she lay. Velasco had dragged himself to his knees and was peering
about him, feeling with his hands in the dim waning light. He was
muttering to himself in little outbursts of anger and rebellion,
rocking his arms to and fro.

"What a hole! What a beastly place! The floor is wet; ugh!--The walls
are dank and shiny--things are crawling! Good heavens, something ran
over my foot!--It must be a rat, scurrying--scampering! Sapristi!
There's another! What a scrape to be in--what a scrape!"

The girl lifted her head and looked at him, straining her eyes for the
outline of his shoulders, the mass of his dark curls. He had turned
half away and was wringing his hands, feeling them and exclaiming to
himself. She crept towards him and stretched out her hand, touching
his shoulder.

"Monsieur--Ah, Monsieur Velasco!"

He shuddered away from her: "You, is it you! Are you alive? I thought
you were dead! Mon Dieu, I thought I was shut in with a corpse! It is
frightful, horrible! I have suffered! God, how I have suffered--the
torture of the damned!"

"Monsieur!"

"My hands are cut; I know they are cut! Look, can you see,--are they
covered with blood? I am sure I feel it trickling!--Look!"

"No--no, Monsieur, there is no blood."

"I tell you I feel it--and my shoulder, my arm--I shall never be able
to play again! I am ruined--ruined--and for what? Why did you come to
me? Why didn't you go to someone else--anybody?"

"Ah forgive me, forgive me." The girl crept closer and laid her hand
on his shoulder, pathetically as if half afraid. "I shouldn't have
gone to you, but--listen, Monsieur--let me tell you--let me explain! I
thought there was no danger, not for you, otherwise--Oh, do believe me,
not for the world would I have done it! I knew you were an artist;
Bobo told us you were going to Germany--I thought--Can you ever forgive
me?"

Her voice broke a little and she was silent.

Velasco went on rocking himself, feeling his arms, his hands, his
fingers at in