'He's bound for the river,' shouted one of the men. Then he flung himself from the window. The other followed, and after him the officer.
Sinclair stood in the dark room, biting his hands. 'If he swims across and reaches the bush, we sha'n't see him again,' he muttered furiously.
Then he struck a match. The pale, sulphurous flame lit up the room weirdly. Marie's nerves had given way, and she lay in a chair sobbing with weakness.
The hunter brought in the lamp from outside. As darkness disappeared, Menotah rose from the ground and tottered with feeble motions towards the door. That frightful strain had been removed at last. The work for which she had retained life and strength was done. Her vengeance had been accomplished, so she might rest--rest in the peace of death, for now there remained no further duty in life.
She spoke in a low voice of anguish. 'Has he escaped? They did not seize him? Tell me.'
Sinclair turned viciously upon her. 'Damn you!' he snarled, 'I could fix you for this. You've robbed me of my revenge, after all my planning and waiting. But you'll have to pay the devil now. Wait till they come back. I tell you, if they haven't got him you'll swing instead. They'll hang you, right enough, for this.'
Madly she drank in the glad truth of his opening words. Then she moved again nearer the door, as though she would once more seek a hiding place.
But tension never fails to find the weakest spot.
Suddenly she flung both hands to her burning forehead, staggered on another couple of paces, then fell crushed to the floor, with a low, heart-breaking cry.
The kindly darkness of insensibility blotted away for a time her madness and her pain.
Thus the weak hand, which was to have dealt the death blow, gave life to the traitor and liberty to the betrayer. For a secret tendril of love still clung and quivered about the dead heart. This might not be killed entirely, nor stamped out by a mere effort of the will, though for long it lay quiescent, in the mood of eternal silence. The presence, the sight of the once loved, aroused that latent force into hot overwhelming life, banished all recollection of duty, cast into oblivion memory of the sacred oath, the curse of her shattered life.
