Part 65 (2/2)
Then she remembered that other door only a few feet away with its key on the inside and with Jean Marot on the outside. And she trembled more than ever.
What would Jean think of her?
Of course, she knew he would be likely to force the closet door; but when he had found her missing,--what then? Would he be angry? Would he not suspect some trick? Would he persevere till he found her?
It was all about Jean,--of herself she scarcely thought, only so far as the effect might come through him. All at once she felt rather than heard the dull sound of the breaking door beyond.
”Ah! he has broken the door. He will come! He has discovered it!”
She beat the walls with her small fists,--kicked the unresponsive stone with her thin little shoes,--her blows gave out no sound. If she only had something to knock with----
She fumbled blindly in the darkness among the boxes. Perhaps--yes, here was one open, and--
”Voila!”
She laid her hand on a heavy, cylindrical substance like a piece of iron gas-pipe, only--funny, but it was packed in something like sawdust.
She tapped smartly on the wall with it--once, twice, thrice--at regular intervals, then listened.
The two similar raps from the other side showed that she was both heard and understood.
”He has found it. Ah! here he is!”
And with her last exclamation Jean appeared, candle in hand, peering into the room and at Mlle. Fouchette in the dazed way more characteristic of the somnambulist than of one awake and in the full possession of his senses.
”Mon Dieu! mon enfant, what have we here?” he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed as soon as he recovered breath. ”What is it? Are you all right? How foolish you are, little one!”
”All right, mon ami.”
And she briefly and rapidly recited her adventures, at the end triumphantly exhibiting the bit of iron pipe with which she had opened communication.
His face suddenly froze with horror!
”Give it to me!”
He s.n.a.t.c.hed it from her hand excitedly and held it an instant apart from his candle.
”A thousand thunders!” he gasped, at the same time handling the thing gingerly and looking for a place to lay it down.
”But----”
”It is a dynamite bomb!” he said, hoa.r.s.ely.
”Mon Dieu!”
She turned as white as a sheet and staggered backward only to come in contact with one of the boxes on the floor. She recoiled from this as if she had been threatened by a snake. Mlle. Fouchette was quite feminine. A mouse now would have scared her into convulsions.
”Where did you get this, pet.i.te?” he asked. ”It is death,--a horrible death!”
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