Ned was after him without a moment's consideration; life seemed so small a thing to him that he could not stop to think of it; but Ted Cruttenden sprang forward, also, to hold him back. The Fates did that, however, for as he would have plunged into the burning house, the upper hinge of one of the wide hall doors gave way, and as it swung inwards with a crash, just touched Ned's forearm, and snapped it like a bulrush. As he staggered, Ted had hold of him. "You can't," he said. "He knows every turn, and may do it yet if the stairs stand. It's madness for you. And my God! there's Mrs. Tresillian. Why did they let her come? we didn't tell her on purpose----" Ned, dazed with a pain he had hardly located, had only time to wonder stupidly how she had managed to change her dress--she wore a coat and skirt--before she was beside him clinging to his unhurt arm. "Father!" she said. "Ned, where is father?" He shook his head. "Doing his duty, I suppose," he muttered; "I tried to follow, but got hurt. Try to keep calm if you can, Nell, there's a chance still." Yes! a chance, if the fire-proof stairs were fire-proof. She stood quiet, silent; only once he heard her say to herself, "Why did I wait--oh! why didn't I come at once?" So the minutes passed, and the crowds of Camhaven fisherfolk giving up hope of more excitement here tonight, sought it elsewhere, though already a murmur had come out of the fog that there was no immediate danger; a big ship was on the sunken rocks, and had established communication with the shore. That was all. And still the minutes passed, and Ned stood holding Helen's hand in his. Yet there was no sign of returning feet upon the fireproof stair. A little breeze springing up had drifted the smoke south-west, obscuring the balcony so they could see nothing. Those who knew her began to look at her with pitying eyes. Then in an instant something in which all else was forgotten--a sharp sound like the crack of a rifle, a quick upburst of sparks, then a great crash, and for a few moments silence and darkness. The roof had fallen in. "I'll take her home, Lord Blackborough," said Peter Ramsay, for all her height lifting her easily. "You will be wanted here. Mr. Hirsch, I may use your motor?" "Broken," replied Mr. Hirsch, who was as white as a sheet, the tears almost running down his cheeks. "I drove it myself, and I didn't understand, but the Wrexham's is here. My God! what a frightful thing--_shrecklich! schrecklich!_" His voice shook; these things were not in the bond. Yet one bond had been kept, for in an hour's time, when the flames had eaten their full of the frail thing which had dared to usurp Cam's point, they found Sir Geoffrey half-way down the stair caught in a trap between two gaps in what had been scheduled as a fire-proof staircase. He held the child in his arms, her head, wrapped in his coat to preserve her from the smoke, nestled close upon his breast.