and firm and strong; and it did not occur to him that we could
have passed between them. I am afraid to say how few inches they
were apart.

As he turned, he cast a casual glance at the bed--at us; and
hesitated. He had the candle in his hand, having taken it to the
window the better to examine the bars; and it obscured his sight.
He did not see us. The three crouching forms, the strained white
faces, the starting eyes, that lurked in the shadow of the
curtain escaped him. The wild beating of our hearts did not
reach his ears. And it was well for him that it was so. If he
had come up to the bed I think that we should have killed him, I
know that we should have tried. All the blood in me had gone to
my head, and I saw him through a haze--larger than life. The
exact spot near the buckle of his cloak where I would strike him,
downwards and inwards, an inch above the collar-bone,--this only
I saw clearly. I could not have missed it. But he turned away,
his face darkening, and went back to the group near the door, and
never knew the risk he had run.



CHAPTER VI.

MADAME'S FRIGHT.

And we breathed again. The agony of suspense, which Bezers'
pause had created, passed away. But the night already seemed to
us as a week of nights. An age of experience, an aeon of
adventures cut us off--as we lay shaking behind the curtain--from