Then, as the smoke cleared away, she saw that Claire was Unhurt. Sir Adrian had deliberately fired above her head and was now rocking his long, lean body to and fro in a paroxysm of horrible, noiseless mirth. Evidently he purposed to amuse himself by inflicting the torture of suspense upon his victim before he actually murdered her, for Latimer had been at one time an expert revolver shot, and, even drug-ridden as he had since become, he could not well have missed his helpless target by accident. Claire’s head had fallen back, but no merciful oblivion of unconsciousness had come to her relief. Her mouth was a little open and the breath came in short, quick gasps between her grey lips. Her face looked like a mask, set in a blank stupor of horror. The sound of the shot brought Blaise and Nick racing to Jean’s side. One glance through the glass door sufficed them. “God in heaven! He’s gone mad!” Nick’s voice was quick with fear for the woman he loved. “Get Tucker here at once!” Blaise’s swift command, flung at her as he and Nick leaped forward, sent Jean flying along the terrace as fast as feet winged with unutterable terror could carry her. As she ran, she heard the crash of splintering glass as the two men she had left behind smashed in the panel of the locked door, and, almost simultaneously, Sir Adrian’s pistol barked again--another shot, and then a third in quick succession. The sound seemed to wring every nerve in her body... had that madman shot him? With sobbing breath she rushed blindly on into the house and met the butler, running too, white faced and horror-stricken. “My God, miss! Sir Adrian’s murdering her ladyship--and the room door’s locked!” The man almost babbled out the words in his extremity of fear. “The terrace door... Quick, Tucker!”--Jean gasped out the order. “Mr. Brennan’s there they’ve broken in the glass...” Not waiting to hear the end of the sentence, Tucker bolted out of the hall and along the terrace, while Jean leaned up against the doorway drawing long, shuddering breaths that seemed actually to tear their way through her throat and yet brought no relief to the agonised thudding of her heart. For the moment she was physically unable to run another yard. But her mind was working with abnormal clarity and swiftness. This was her doing--hers! If she had not dissuaded Nick that day when he had proposed taking Claire away with him, all this would never have happened.... Claire would have been safe--safe! But she had interfered, clinging to her belief that no real good ever came by doing wrong, and now her creed had failed her utterly. Nick’s resistance of temptation was culminating in a ghastly tragedy that might have been avoided. To Jean it seemed in that moment as if her world were falling in ruins about her.