Page:Bat Wing 1921.djvu/322

 Inspector Aylesbury removed his cap and scratched his head vigorously.

“In order that we may avoid waste of valuable time,” said Harley, finally, “let us take a hasty observation from here. As a matter of fact, I have done so already, as nearly as was possible, without employing this rough apparatus.”

He knelt down beside the yew tree, lowering his head so that the candlelight shone upon the brown, eager face, and looked upward, over the top of the sun-dial and through the hole in the cardboard.

“Yes,” he muttered, a note of rising excitement in his voice. “As I thought, as I thought. Come, gentlemen, let us hurry.”

He walked rapidly out of the garden, and up the steps, whilst we followed dumb with wonder—or such at any rate was the cause of my own silence.

In the hall Pedro was standing, a bunch of keys in his hand, and evidently expecting Harley.

“Will you take us by the shortest way to the tower stairs?” my friend directed.

“Yes, sir.”

Doubting, wondering, scarcely knowing whether to be fearful or jubilant, I followed, along a carpeted corridor, and thence, a heavy, oaken door being unlocked, across a dusty and deserted apartment apparently intended for a drawing room. From this, through a second doorway we were led into a small, square, unfurnished room, which I knew must be situated in the base of the tower. Yet a third door was unlocked, and:

“Here is the stair, sir,” said Pedro.

In Indian file we mounted to the first floor, to find ourselves in a second, identical room, also stripped of furniture and decorations. Harley barely