Page:Stanley Weyman--Count Hannibal.djvu/258

246 Tignonville, holding the lanthorn, and La Tribe, who feared to release Tuez-les-Moines, remained with the fanatic.

The Countess’s eyes met her old lover’s, and whether old memories overcame her, or, now that the danger was nearly past, she began to give way, she swayed a little on her feet. But he did not notice it. He was sunk in black rage—rage against her, rage against himself.

“Take the light,” she muttered unsteadily. “And—and he must follow!”

“And you?”

But she could bear it no longer. “Oh, go,” she wailed. “Go! Will you never go? If you love me, if you ever loved me, I implore you to go.”

He had betrayed little of a lover’s feeling. But he could not resist that appeal, and he turned silently. Seizing Tuez-les-Moines by the other arm, he drew him by force to the trap.

“Quiet, fool,” he muttered savagely when the man would have resisted, “and go down! If we stay to kill him, we shall have no way of escape, and his life will be dearly bought. Down, man, down!” And between them, in a struggling silence, with now and then an audible rap, or a ring of metal, the two forced the desperado to descend.

La Tribe followed hastily. Tignonville was the last to go. In the act of disappearing he raised his lanthorn for a last glimpse of the Countess. To his astonishment the passage was empty; she was gone. Hard by him a door stood an inch or two ajar, and he guessed that it was hers, and swore under his breath, hating her at that moment. But he did not guess how nicely she had calculated her strength; how nearly exhaustion had overcome her; or that, even while he paused—a fatal pause had he known it—eyeing the dark opening of the door, she lay as one dead, on the bed within. She had fallen in a swoon, from