CHAPTER VMontague hesitated only an instant. He sprang up to the deck. “Where is Mrs. Taylor?” he cried.
“She went below, sir,” said the man,hesitating; but Montague sprang past him and down the companionway.
At the foot of the stairs he found himself in a broad entrance-hall, lighted by a glass dome above. He sprang toward a door which opened in the direction of the cry he had heard, and shouted aloud, “Lucy! Lucy!” He heard her answer beyond the doorway, and he seized the knob and tried it. The door was locked.
“Open the door!” he shouted.
There was no sound. “Open the door!” he called again, “or I’ll break it down.”
Suiting his action to theword, he flung his weight upon it. The barrier cracked; and then suddenly he heard a man’s voice. “All right. Wait.”
Someone fumbled at the kn
