Shorthouse sprang from the chair and crossed the room swiftly, taking up
his position beside the door, but out of range of the keyhole. The two
candles flared unevenly on the table at the foot of the bed. The steps
were slow and cautious--it seemed thirty seconds between each one--but
the person who was taking them was very close to the door. Already he
had topped the stairs and was shuffling almost silently across the bit
of landing.
The secretary slipped his hand into his pistol pocket and drew back
further against the wall, and hardly had he completed the movement when
the sounds abruptly ceased and he knew that somebody was standing just
outside the door and preparing for a careful observation through the
keyhole.
He was in no sense a coward. In action he was never afraid. It was the
waiting and wondering and the uncertainty that might have loosened his
nerves a little. But, somehow, a wave of intense horror swept over him
for a second as he thought of the bestial maniac and his attendant Jew;
and he would rather have faced a pack of wolves than have to do with
either of these men.
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