or him, not her. And yet, with this too, he gives her
silently to understand that, if she shows any treachery toward him, he
will not leave it unrewarded.

Cowed, frightened, trembling at what she knows not, Dora staggers
backward, and, laying a hand upon the wall beside her, tries to regain
her self-possession. The others are all talking together, she is
therefore unobserved. She stands, still panting and pallid, trying
to collect her thoughts.

Only one thing comes clearly to her, filling her with loathing of
herself and an unnamed dread--it is that, by her own double-dealing and
falseness toward Florence, she has seemed to enter into a compact with
this man to be a companion in whatever crime he may decide upon. His
very look seems to implicate her, to drag her down with him to his
level. She feels herself chained to him--his partner in a vile
conspiracy. And what further adds to the horror of the situation is the
knowledge that she knows herself to be blindly ignorant of whatever
plans he may be forming.

After a few seconds she rouses herself, and wins back some degree of
composure. It is of course a mere weakness to believe herself in the
power of Arthur Dynecourt, she tries to convince herself. He is no more
than any other ordinary acquaintance. If indeed she has helped him a
little in his efforts to secure the love of Florence, there was no great
harm in that, though of course it served her own purpose also.

"How pale you are, Mrs. Talbot?" remarks Sir Adrian suddenly, wheeling
round to look at her more closely. "Has this damp old place really
affected your nerves? Come, let us go down again, and forget in the
sunshine that bloody deeds were ever committed here or elsewhere."

"I am nervous, I confess," responds Dora, in a low tone. "Yes, yes--let
us leave this terrible room forever."

"So be it," says Sir Adrian gayly. "For my part, I feel no desire to
ever re-enter it."

"It is very high art, I suppose," observes Ethel Villiers, glancing
round the walls. "Uncomfortable places always are. It would be quite
a treasure to Lady Betty Trefeld, who raves over the early Britons. It
seems rather thrown away upon us. Captain Ringwood, you look as if you
had been suddenly turned into stone. Let me pass, please."

"It was uncommonly friendly of Ringwood not to have let the door slam,
and so imprisoned us for life," says Sir Adrian, with a laugh. "I am
sure we owe him a debt of gratitude."

"I hope you'll all