([Quex] immediately locks the door at which [the Duchess] has departed and slips the key into his waistcoat pocket. This done, he pulls the bell-rope communicating with the maid’s room and takes up a position against the wall so that the opening of the passage door conceals him from the view of the person entering. After a pause the door is opened and Sophy appears. The frills of her nightdress peep out from under the Mandarin robe, and she is wearing a pair of scarlet cloth slippers; altogether she presents an odd, fantastic figure. She pauses in the doorway hesitatingly, then steadies herself and, with a defiant air, stalks into the bedroom. Directly she has moved away, Quex softly closes the door, locks it, and pockets the key. Meanwhile Sophy, looking about the bedroom for the