"
"Oh, they'd promise, all right," I agreed; "but how could we hold
them to it?"
"Well, a promise is a promise. And it's our only chance."
"No, Harry; to trust them would be folly. The minute we stepped
through that doorway they would be on us--the whole beggarly,
smelly lot of them."
"Then there is no chance--none whatever?" put in Desiree.
"None. We may as well admit the worst. And the worst is best
for us now. Really, we are in luck; we die in our own way and at
our own time. But there is one difficulty."
Then, in answer to their glances of inquiry, I added
significantly: "We have no weapons. We cannot allow ourselves to
starve--the end must come before that, for as soon as they saw us
weakening we would be at their mercy."
There was comprehension and horror in Desiree's eyes, but she
looked at me with a brave attempt to smile as she took from her
hair something which gleamed and shone in the light from the
flaming urns. It was a tiny steel blade with a handle of pearl
studded with diamonds.
I had seen it before many times--a present, Desiree had told me,
from the young man I had seen in the royal coach on that day in
Madrid when I had first heard the name of Le Mire.
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