Lizzie opened her mouth to scream. But for once she did not carry out her purpose.
"Not a sound out of you!" warned the Unknown brutally, almost jabbing the revolver into her ribs. He wheeled on Bailey.
"Close that satchel," he commanded, "and put it back where you found it!"
Bailey's fist closed. He took a step toward his captor.
"You--" he began in a furious voice. But the steely glint in the eyes of the Unknown was enough to give any man pause.
"Jack!" pleaded Dale. Bailey halted.
"Do what he tells you!" Miss Cornelia insisted, her voice shaking.
A brave man may be willing to fight with odds a hundred to one--but only a fool will rush on certain death. Reluctantly, dejectedly, Bailey obeyed--stuffed the money back in the satchel and replaced the latter in its corner of shadows near the window.
"It's the Bat--it's the Bat!" whispered Lizzie eerily, and, for once her gloomy prophecies seemed to be in a fair way of justification, for "Blow out that candle!" commanded the Unknown sternly, and, after a moment of hesitation on Miss Cornelia's part, the room was again plunged in darkness except for the red glow at the window.
This finished Lizzie for the evening. She spoke from a dry throat.
"I'm going to scream!" she sobbed hysterically. "I can't keep it back!"
But at last she had encountered someone who had no patience with her vagaries.
"Put that woman in the mantel-room and shut her up!" ordered the Unknown, the muzzle of his revolver emphasizing his words with a savage little movement.
Bailey took Lizzie under the arms and started to execute the order. But the sometime colleen from Kerry did not depart without one Parthian arrow.
"Don't shove," she said in tones of the greatest dignity as she stumbled into the Hidden Room. "I'm damn glad to go!"
The iron doors shut behind her. Bailey watched the Unknown intently. One moment of relaxed vigilance and-But though the Unknown was unlocking the door with his left hand the revolver in his right hand was as steady as a rock. He seemed to listen for a moment at the crack of the door.
"Not a sound if you value your lives!" he warned again, he shepherded them away from the direction of the window with his revolver.
"In a moment or two," he said in a hushed, taut voice, "a man will come into this room, either through the door or by that window--the man who started the fire to draw you out of this house."
Bailey threw aside all pride in his concern for Dale's safety.