Page:Belloc Lowndes--The chink in the armour.djvu/314

304 She put the cup down, and pushed it away.

"Please do not ask me to take it," she said firmly. "It really is very bad for me!"

Madame Wachner shrugged her shoulders with an angry gesture.

"So be it," she said, and then imperiously, "Fritz, will you please come with me for a moment into the next room? I have something to ask you."

He got up and silently obeyed his wife. Before leaving the room he slipped the key of the garden gate into his trousers pocket.

A moment later Sylvia, left alone, could hear them talking eagerly to one another in that strange, unknown tongue in which they sometimes—not often—addressed one another.

She got up from her chair, seized with a sudden, eager desire to slip away before they came back. For a moment she even thought of leaving the house without waiting for her hat and little fancy bag; and then, with a strange sinking of the heart she remembered that the white gate was locked, and that L'Ami Fritz had now the key of it in his pocket.

But in no case would Sylvia have had time to do what she had thought of doing, for a moment later her host and hostess were back in the room.

Madame Wachner sat down again at the dining-table,

"One moment!" she exclaimed, rather breathlessly. "Just wait till I 'ave finished my coffee, Sylvia dear, and then L'Ami Fritz will escort you 'ome."

Rather unwillingly, Sylvia again sat down.

Monsieur Wachner was paying no attention either to