"Now! _Now!_" I hardly noticed that he took his blood-stained handkerchief out of my hand. For Bettina had come forward and stood poised, holding her green skirt with both hands, like a child about to curtsey. I stood up. All the room was dancing with my little sister. I got to the door. "_Where are you going to...?_" Betty sang. But she was too amused and excited to notice me. My companion had crossed the room, and was bending over the Grey Hawk. She looked round at him surprised, mocking.... Some power came to help me across the threshold. A footman started up out of the floor and stood before me. "Where are you going?" He echoed Betty. "I am waiting for--one of the gentlemen," I said, and I steadied myself against a chair. If Betty's song stopped, I should know we had failed. I held my breath, as I leaned over and took my last look into the room. Our friend was leaving the grey woman. She played on. Bettina was dancing, a hand on her hip, the other twirling moustachios--playing the gallant. Such a baby she looked! And I had done her hair like that---- "_What is your fortune, my pretty maid?_" The man had come out and softly shut the door. He gave the footman a strange look and passed him something. "It's all right," he said. The footman looked in his hand and stared. "Mais, merci--merci, monsieur." He vanished. I went towards the stairs. "_That's_ not the way," the voice said harshly. "Shan't I get a cloak----" "For God's sake, no! It's a question of moments now." He was undoing the door. "Run for your life. First to the left--second to the right--a cab-rank." I fled out of the house. CHAPTER XXIX WHERE? I stood ringing. I thundered at the knocker. I beat the door with my fist. An old man opened at last. "Mrs. Harborough! Where is she?" The old man tried to keep me out. But he was gentle and frail. I forced my way past. I called and ran along a passage, trying doors that opened into the darkness. At last! A room where a woman sat alone--reading by a shaded light. "Who are you?" I cried out. She laid her book in her lap. "Are _you_ Mrs. Harborough? Then come--come quickly ... I'll tell you on the way----" The old woman lifted the folds of her double chin and looked at me through spectacles. "You must come and help me to get Bettina...." I broke into distracted sobbing on the name. "Bettina----! Bettina----!" I seized the lady's hand and tried to draw her out of her chair. But I was full of trembling. She sat there massive, calm, with a power of inert resistance, that made me feel I could as easily drag her house out of the Square by its knocker, as move the woman planted there in her chair. Neither haste nor perturbation in the voice that asked me: "What has happened?" "_Not yet!_" I cried out. "Nothing has happened yet! But we must be quick. Oh, God, let us be quick----" The butler had followed me in and was asking something. "Yes," said the quiet voice, "pay the cabman."