She cursed herself for the blundering, feeble way she had set about
revenge; she cursed the moon; the agony of her limbs; the stretch which
lay between one shadow and another; but she laughed, though no sound
issued from the gaping mouth, as she stood in the last patch of shadow
which was separated by some few yards of silvery path from the black
blot upon the wall which covered the secret door.

They had hunted and harried her, and walked upon her body lying in the
dust, but they had lost her and had gone back to their hovels to eat
and sleep, and maybe once more cast up the reckoning of the money she
owed them, the which--she swore the most horrible oath--she would never
pay.

She gathered up her dust-ridden garments and stole swiftly across the
moonlit space; she had just touched the edge of the shadow, she was
almost home, when, with a mighty shout, they were upon her. Out of the
houses, out of the courtyards, down the streets they swarmed, children
and women falling, to be jerked to their feet by the men who ran
silently, urged on by the fanatic who for years had hugged the idea of
some such moment of most horrible revenge.

And then to the sinister sound of the rushing feet there was added the
baying of many pariah dogs which, from every conceivable corner and
from miles away, raced like a pack of wolves upon the Steppes, to join
the hunt.

Blind with terror, shaking in agony, Zulannah fumbled helplessly for
the special brick; it lay, she knew, in the third row and had as mark a
jutting piece of mortar in the middle.