Out of Context

The Green Eyes of Bâst
Sax Rohmer

If the sound of his voice had startled me, its effect upon my visitor was truly singular. Taking a swift step towards me, she grasped my arm with her strangely slender gloved hand. Now that she stood so close to me, I realized that she was even taller than I had supposed, nearly as tall as myself, in fact. Her swift, lithe movements possessed an indescribable grace which, as I thought, and experienced a sudden revulsion, were oddly uncanny–cat-like.

“Oh, Mr. Addison,” she said, and drew even nearer, so that I could feel her breath upon my cheek, “I fear that man as one fears a snake. I am going to ask a favor of you. I see that there is another door to this room, and I have a particular reason for wishing to avoid him. I don’t know where that doorway leads to, but I can doubtless find my way out.”

Her grasp upon my arm tightened.

“Dare I ask you,” she added pleadingly, “to conceal from him if necessary the fact that I have been here?”

“But Martin knows that you have been here,” I protested, my mind in a whirl at this sudden turn of affairs; “and the man sitting on the bench outside must have seen you come in also.”

“He did not,” she replied rapidly, “and Martin does not know who I am.”