Page:Tongues of Flame (1924).pdf/376

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half-pouted, dashing the back of her hand across her eyes and then looking slyly at Henry. "They'll be coming to let you out in a minute."

"But who did kill him?" Harrington demanded dazedly.

"They'll tell you—they'll tell you in a minute," effervesced the girl, her natural love of sensation and climax asserting itself.

"But it was you that found out who, of course," divined Henry.

"Oh, yes—of course!" admitted little Miss Marceau, with impish pride.

Harrington, quite coming to, seized her arms and shook her joyously from head to foot. "You," he realized, "you got me out of this mess!" Then he held her off and gazed at her up and down, estimatingly, admiringly; so that the girl for a moment had an enraptured feeling that he was seeing her for the first time—really seeing her. She felt this more as he flung an arm about her and gave her a succession of ecstatic pressures while they walked behind Jailor White, along the corridor and down the stair.

But though Henry's arm was round Lahleet, they were proxy pressures that he gave her, for his mind was already racing up the hill to Billie. He had one of those delicious moments of feeling immensely strong—very rare in this last week. He saw himself as a huge and towering trec, snatched at by the storm, smashed at by lightning bolts; but the storm was over, the thunderings past, and he still stood—triumphant! In a few minutes he could be offering himself to Billie, not furtively but boldly, a bright and shining pillar for her to lean upon.