“It is all done,” he said, with a nod of the head.  “I will bring the car down to the door.  Then I’ll drive you to Geneva and come back with the car here.”

He cautiously opened the latticed door of the window, listened for a moment, and ran silently down the drive.  Adele closed the door again, but she did not bolt it.  She came back into the room; she looked at Celia, as she lay back upon the settee, with a long glance of indecision.  And then, to Celia’s surprise—­for she had given up all hope—­the indecision in her eyes became pity.  She suddenly ran across the room and knelt down before Celia.  With quick and feverish hands she untied the cord which fastened the train of her skirt about her knees.

At first Celia shrank away, fearing some new cruelty.  But Adele’s voice came to her ears, speaking—­and speaking with remorse.

“I can’t endure it!” she whispered.  “You are so young—­too young to be killed.”

The tears were rolling down Celia’s cheeks.  Her face was pitiful and beseeching.

“Don’t look at me like that, for God’s sake, child!” Adele went on, and she chafed the girl’s ankles for a moment.

“Can you stand?” she asked.

Celia nodded her head gratefully.  After all, then, she was not to die.  It seemed to her hardly possible.  But before she could rise a subdued whirr of machinery penetrated into the room, and the motor-car came slowly to the front of the villa.

“Keep still!” said Adele hurriedly, and she placed herself in front of Celia.

Wethermill opened the wooden door, while Celia’s heart raced in her bosom.

“I will go down and open the gate,” he whispered.  “Are you ready?”

“Yes.”

Wethermill disappeared; and this time he left the door open.  Adele helped Celia to her feet.  For a moment she tottered; then she stood firm.

“Now run!” whispered Adele.  “Run, child, for your life!”

Celia did not stop to think whither she should run, or how she should escape from Wethermill’s search.  She could not ask that her lips and her hands might be freed.  She had but a few seconds.  She had one thought—­to hide herself in the darkness of the garden.  Celia fled across the room, sprang wildly over the sill, ran, tripped over her skirt, steadied herself, and was swung off the ground by the arms of Harry Wethermill.

“There we are,” he said, with his shrill, wavering laugh.  “I opened the gate before.”  And suddenly Celia hung inert in his arms.

The light went out in the salon.  Adele Rossignol, carrying Celia’s cloak, stepped out at the side of the window.

“She has fainted,” said Wethermill.  “Wipe the mould off her shoes and off yours too—­carefully.  I don’t want them to think this car has been out of the garage at all.”

Adele stooped and obeyed.  Wethermill opened the door of the car and flung Celia into a seat.  Adele followed and took her seat opposite the girl.  Wethermill stepped carefully again on to the grass, and with the toe of his shoe scraped up and ploughed the impressions which he and Adele Rossignol had made on the ground, leaving those which Celia had made.  He came back to the window.