"Certainly not," he said with dignity. "Of course they're armed. h.e.l.lo, who's here?"

It was Lambart entering, bearing in his hand a .45 revolver.

"The burglar-alarm, sir," he said, with as little excitement as he might have announced the readiness of dinner. "The indicator points to Mr.

Denby's room."

"Good old Lambart," his employer said heartily. "You go ahead, and we'll follow. No, you keep the beastly thing," he exclaimed, when the butler handed him the weapon. "You're a better shot than I am, Lambart."

"Mikey," Alice called to him, "if you're going to be killed, I want to be killed, too."

The Harringtons followed the admirable Lambart up the stairway, while Nora gazed after them with a species of fascinated curiosity that was not compounded wholly of fear. Intensely alive to the vivid interest of these swiftly moving scenes through which she was pa.s.sing, Nora--although she could scream with the best of them--was not in reality badly scared.

"I don't want to be killed," she announced with decision.

Monty moved to her side. He had an idea that if he must die or be arrested, he would like Nora to live on, cherishing the memory that he was a man.

"Neither do I!" he cried. "I wish I'd never gone into this. I knew when I dreamed about Sing Sing last night that it meant something."

"Gone into what?" Nora demanded.

"I'm liable to get shot any minute."

"What!" she cried anxiously.

"This may be my last five minutes on earth, Nora."

"Oh, Monty," she returned, "what have you done?" She looked at him in ecstatic admiration; never had he seemed so heroic and desirable. "Was it murder?"

"If I come out of it alive, will you marry me?" he asked desperately.

"Oh, Monty!" she exclaimed, and flung herself into his arms. "Why did you put it off so long?"

"I didn't need your protection so much," he told her; "and anyway it takes a crisis like this to make me say what I really feel."

"I love you anyway, no matter what you've done," she said contentedly.

He looked at her more brightly. "I'm the happiest man in the world," he declared, "providing," he added cautiously, "I don't get shot."

She raised her head from his shoulder and tapped the package in his pocket. "What's that?" she asked.

"That's my heart," he said sentimentally.

"But why do you wear it on the right side?" she queried.

"Oh, that," he said more gravely, "I'd forgotten all about it. It belongs to Steve. That shows I love you," he added firmly; "I'd forgotten all about it."

As he spoke there was the shrill call of a police whistle outside. "The police!" he gasped.

"Don't let them get you," she whispered. "They are coming this way."

"Quick," he said, grabbing her arm and leading her to a door. "We'll hide here." Now that danger, as he apprehended it, was definitely at hand, his spirits began to rise. He was of the kind which finds in suspense the greatest horror. They had barely reached the shelter of a door when Duncan and Gibbs ran in.

"Come on, Harry," Duncan called to the slower man, "he's upstairs. Get your gun ready."

Nora clasped her lover's hand tighter. "There'll be some real shooting,"

she whispered; "I hope Alice doesn't get hurt. Listen!"

"The Chief's got him for sure," Gibbs panted, making his ascent at the best speed he could gather.

"They've gone," Nora said, peering out; then she ventured into the hall.

"Who's the chief?" she asked.

"The chief of police I guess," he groaned. "This is awful, Nora. I can't have you staying here with all this going on. Go back into the card-room, and I'll let you know what's happened as soon as I can."

"But what are you going to do?" she asked.

"I'm going to wait for Steve; he's very likely to want me."

"I'm not afraid," Nora said airily.

"But I am," he retorted; "I'm afraid for you. Be a good girl and do as I say, and I'll come as soon as the trouble's over."

"I just hate to miss anything," she pouted. "Still if you really wish it." She looked at him more tenderly than he had ever seen her look at any human being before. "Don't get killed, Monty, dear."

Monty took her in his arms and kissed her. "I don't want to," he said, "especially now."

When the door had shut behind her he took out the necklace with the idea of secreting it in an unfindable place. He remembered a Poe story where a letter was hidden in so obvious a spot that it defied Parisian commissaries of police. But the letters were usual things and pearl necklaces were not, and he took it down from the mantel where for a second he had let it lie, and rammed it under a sofa-cushion on the nearby couch. That, too, was not a brilliant idea and, while he was wondering if the pearls would dissolve if he dropped them in a decanter of whiskey on a table near him, there were loud voices heard at the head of the stairway, and he fled from the spot.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

When the Harringtons followed their butler into Denby's room, they were appalled at what they could not see but heard without difficulty. A strange voice, a harsh, coa.r.s.e voice rapping out oaths and imprecations, a man fighting with some opponent who remained silent. While they who owned the house stood helpless, Lambart turned on the lights.

The sudden glare showed them Denby was the silent fighter. The other man, a heavily built fellow, seemed for the moment blinded by the lights, and stopped for a second. And it was in this second that Denby uppercut him so that he fell with a thud to the floor.

Then they saw Denby pick up a revolver that was lying by the stranger's side.

"What's the matter?" cried Michael, while Lambart busied himself with making the room tidy and replacing overturned chairs.

"This man," said Denby, still panting from his efforts, "tried to break in, and Miss Cartwright and I got him."

"Good Lord!" Michael e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed.

"How splendid of you!" Alice cried. "Ethel, you're a heroine, my dear."

Taylor, who had not been put out by the blow, scrambled to his feet and was pushed into a chair. Denby stood conveniently near with the revolver a foot from his heart.