So far everything was for the best, nay, it might be better still, for Segrave enraged and maddened at his losses, might succeed in getting Lambert imprisoned for stealing, and cheating, even at the cost of his own condemnation to a fine for gambling.

The Endicotts had done their part well.  The man especially, with his wide cuffs and his quick movements.  No one there present could have the slightest doubt but that Lambert was guilty.  Satisfied, therefore, that all had gone according to his own wishes, Sir Marmaduke withdrew from further conflict or argument with the unfortunate young man, whom he had so deliberately and so hopelessly ruined.

And because he thus kept aloof, his ears were not so completely filled with the din, nor his mind so wholly engrossed by the hand-to-hand struggle between the two young men, that he did not perceive that other sound, which, in spite of barred windows and drawn curtains, came up from the street below.

At first he had only listened carelessly to the measured tramp.  But the cry of “Halt!” issuing from immediately beneath the windows caused his cheeks to blanch and his muscles to stiffen with a sudden sense of fear.

He cast a rapid glance all around.  Segrave and Lambert—­both flushed and panting—­were forcibly held apart.  Sir Marmaduke noted with a grim smile that the latter was obviously the center of a hostile group, whilst Segrave was surrounded by a knot of sympathizers who were striving outwardly to pacify him, whilst in reality urging him on through their unbridled vituperations directed against the other man.

The noise of arguments, of shrill voices, of admonitions and violent abuse had in no sense abated.

Over the sea of excited faces Sir Marmaduke caught the wide-open, terrified eyes of Editha de Chavasse.

She too, had heard.

He beckoned to her across the room with a slight gesture of the hand, and she obeyed the silent call as quickly as she dared, working her way round to him, without arousing the attention of the crowd.

“Do not lose your head,” he whispered as soon as she was near him and seeing the wild terror expressed in every line of her face.  “Slip into the next room ... and leave the door ajar....  Do this as quietly as may be ... now ... at once ... then wait there until I come.”

Again she obeyed him silently and swiftly, for she knew what that cry of “Halt!” meant, uttered at the door of her house.  She had heard it, even as Sir Marmaduke had done, and after it the peremptory knocks, the loud call, the word of command, followed by the sound of an awed and supplicating voice, entering a feeble protest.

She knew what all that meant, and she was afraid.

As soon as Sir Marmaduke saw that she had done just as he had ordered, he deliberately joined the noisy groups which were congregated around Segrave and Lambert.

He pushed his way forward and anon stood face to face with the young man on whom he had just wreaked such an irreparable wrong.  Not a thought of compunction or remorse rose in his mind as he looked down at the handsome flushed face—­quite calm and set outwardly in spite of the terrible agony raging within heart and mind.