"Yes," he said. He lifted on an elbow and repeated in a voice which
must have sounded strange enough to the listener beyond the door. "Yes!"
he said. "Yes!"

"Go away!" he cried of a sudden, making a wide, dim, imperious gesture
in the dark.

"No, no," the imploring whisper crept in. "You're making yourself
sick--Christopher--all over nothing--nothing in the world. It's so
foolish--so foolish--foolish! Oh, if I could only tell you,
Christopher--if I could tell you--"

"Tell me _what_?" He shuddered with the ecstasy of his own irony. "Who
that man is? That 'caretaker'? What he's doing here? What _you're_ doing
here?--" He began to scream in a high, brittle voice: "_Go away from
that door! Go away!_"

This time she obeyed. He heard her retreating, soft-footed and
frightened, along the hall. She was abandoning him--without so much as
trying the door, just once again, to see if it were still bolted against
her.

She did not care. She was sneaking off--down the stairs--Oh, yes, he
knew where.

His lips began to twitch again and his finger nails scratched on the
bedclothes. If only he had something, some weapon, an axe, a broad,
keen, glittering axe! He would show them! He was strong, incredibly
strong! Five men could not have turned him back from what he was going
to do--if only he had something.