XXXI.
AN EVENTFUL QUARTER OF AN HOUR.
When Edgar closed the front door of the Cavanagh mansion behind himselfand Emma, the noise he made was slight, and yet it was heard by earsthat were listening for it in the remote recesses of the kitchen.
"The gentlemen are gone," decided Doris, without any hesitation. "Theycould not move Miss Hermione from her resolves, and I did not think theycould. Nothing can move her but fire, and fire there shall be, and thatto-night."
Stealing towards the front of the house, she listened. All was quiet.She instantly concluded that the young ladies were in the parlor, andglided back to a certain closet under the stairs, into which she peeredwith a satisfied air. "Plenty of stuff there," she commented, andshivered slightly as she thought of putting a candle to the combustiblepile before her. Shutting the door, she crept to another spot where laya huge pile of shavings, and again she nodded with satisfaction at thesight. Finally, she went into the shed, and when she came back shewalked like one who sees the way clear to her purposes.
"I promised Mr. Huckins I would not start the blaze till aftermidnight," said she almost audibly, as she passed again towards thefront. "He was so afraid if the fire got started early that theneighbors would put it out before any harm was done. But I haven't thenerve to do such a thing with the young ladies up-stairs. They might notget down safely, or I might not have the power to wake them. No, I willfire it now, while they are in the parlor, and trust to its going liketinder, as it will. Won't the young gentlemen thank me, and won't theyoung ladies do the same, when they get over the shock of being suddenlythrown upon the world."
Chuckling softly to herself, she looked up-stairs and finally ranquietly up. With a woman's thoughtfulness she remembered certainarticles which she felt were precious to the young ladies. To gatherthese together would be the work of a moment, and it would ease herconscience. Going first to Hermione's room, she threw such objects asshe considered valuable into a sheet, and tied them up. Then she tossedthe bundle thus made out of one of the side windows. Running to Emma'sroom, she repeated her operations; and letting her own things go,hastened down-stairs and went again into the kitchen. When she reissuedit was with a lighted candle in her hand.
Meantime from the poplar walk two eyes were gazing with restlesseagerness upon the house. They belonged to Huckins, who, unknown toEtheridge, unknown to Doris even, had returned to Marston for thepurpose of watching the development of his deadly game. He had stoleninto the garden and was surveying the place, not so much from anyexpectation of fire at this hour, as because his whole interest wascentred in the house and he could not keep his eyes from it.
But suddenly, as he looks, he detects something amiss, and startingforward, with many muttered exclamations, he draws nearer and nearer tothe house, which he presently enters by means of the key he draws fromhis pocket. As he does so, a faint smell of smoke comes to his nostrils,causing him to mutter: "She is three hours too soon; what does she meanby it?"
The door by which he had entered was at the end of a side hall. Hefound the house dark, but he was so accustomed to it by this time, thathe felt no hesitancy as to his steps. He went at first to thesitting-room and looked in; there was no one there. Then he proceeded tothe parlor, which was also empty. "Good," thought he, "they areup-stairs"; and he slid with his quiet step to the staircase, up whichhe went like the ghost or spectre which he had perhaps simulated thenight before. There was a door at the top of the first landing, and hehad some thoughts of simply locking this, and escaping. But, he said tohimself, it would be much more satisfactory to first make sure that thetwo girls were really above, before he locked them in; so he crept upfarther, and finally came to Hermione's room. The door was shut, butfrom the light which shone through the keyhole (a light which Doris hadleft there in her haste and trepidation), he judged Hermione to bewithin, so he softly turned the key that was in the lock, and glidedaway to Emma's apartment. This was also closed, but there was a lightthere, also from the same cause, so there being no key visible he drew aheavy piece of furniture across the doorway, and fled back to thestairs. As he reached them, a blinding gust of smoke swept up throughthe crevices beneath his feet, but he thought he saw his way clearly,and rushed for the landing. But just as he reached it, the door--thedoor he had intended to close behind him--shut sharply in his face, andhe found himself imprisoned. With a shriek, he dashed against it; but itwas locked; and just as he staggered upright again from his violentefforts to batter it down, a red-hot flame shot up through a gap in thestaircase and played about his feet. He yelled, and dashed up thestairs. If he were to suffer for his own crime, he would at least havecompanions in his agony. Calling upon Emma and Hermione, he rushed tothe piece of furniture with which he had barred the former's apartment,and frantically drew it aside. The door remained shut; there was noagonized one within to force it open the moment the pressure against itwas relieved. Stupefied, he staggered away and ran up the twistedstaircase to Hermione's room. Perhaps they were here, perhaps they wereboth here. But all was silent within, and when he had entered andsearched the space before him, even beneath and behind the curtains ofthe bed for its expected occupant, and found no one there, he utteredsuch a cry as that house had never listened to, not even when it echoedto its master's final yell of rage and despair.
Doris meanwhile was suffering her own punishment below. When she hadlighted the three several piles she had prepared, she fled into thefront of the house to spread the alarm and insure the safety of heryoung mistresses. Passing the staircase she had one quick thought of thelikelihood there might be of Hermione or Emma dashing up those stairs inan endeavor to save some of their effects, so she quietly locked thedoor above in order to prevent them. But when she had done this sheheard a shriek, and, startled, she was about to unlock it again when avivid flame shot up between her and the door making any such attemptimpossible. Aghast with terror, fearing that by some error ofcalculation she had shut her young ladies up-stairs after all, she wentshrieking their names through the lower rooms and halls, now fillingwith smoke and lurid with shooting jets of flame. As no response cameand she could find no one in any of the rooms, her terror grew to frenzyand she would have dashed up-stairs at the risk of her life. But it wastoo late; the stairs had already fallen, and the place was one volcanoof seething flame.