"Do not leave me! Stay with me!" he entreats.
Once again, deeply distressed, she looks at Dora. Mrs. Talbot, rising, says distinctly, but with a shamefaced expression-"Do as he asks you. Believe me, by his side is your proper place, not mine."
Saying this, she glides quickly from the room, and does not appear again for several hours.
By luncheon-time it occurs to the guests that Arthur Dynecourt has not been seen since last evening.
Ringwood, carrying this news to the sick-room, the little rescuing party and their auxiliaries, the nurse and doctor, lay their heads together, and decide that, doubtless, having discovered the escape of his prisoner, and, dreading arrest, Arthur has quietly taken himself off, and so avoided the trial and punishment which would otherwise have fallen upon him.
Ringwood is now of opinion that they have acted unwisely in concealing the discovery of Sir Adrian in the haunted chamber. By not speaking to the others, they have given Dynecourt the opportunity of getting away safely, and without causing suspicion.
"Is it not an almost conclusive proof of his guilt, his running away in this cowardly fashion?" says Ethel Villiers. "I think papa and Lady FitzAlmont and everybody should now be told."
So Ringwood, undertaking the office of tale-bearer, goes down-stairs, and, bringing together all the people still remaining in the house, astounds them by his revelation of the discovery and release of Sir Adrian.
The nearest magistrate is sent for, and the case being laid before him, together with the still further evidence given by Sir Adrian himself, who has told them in a weak whisper of Arthur's being privy to his intention of searching the haunted chamber for Florence's bangle on that memorable day of his disappearance, the magistrate issues a warrant for the arrest of Arthur Dynecourt.
But it is all in vain; even though two of the cleverest detectives from Scotland Yard are pressed into the service, no tidings of Arthur Dynecourt come to light. A man answering to his description, but wearing spectacles, had been traced as having gone on board a vessel bound for New York the very day after Sir Adrian was restored to the world, and, when search in other quarters fails, every one falls into the ready belief that this spectacled man was in reality the would-be murderer.
So the days pass on, and it is now quite a month since Ringwood and Florence carried Sir Adrian's senseless form from the haunted chamber, and still Florence holds herself aloof from the man she loves, and, though quite as assiduous as the others in her attentions to him, seems always eager to get away from him, and glad to escape any chance of a tête-à-tête with him. This she does in defiance of the fact that Mrs. Talbot never approaches him except when absolutely compelled.