Page:Chipperfield--Unseen Hands.djvu/267

255 right back to her room, and after you 'phoned I went to the upper hall. Her light was going, but there wasn't a sound until she suddenly opened her door. I had just time to get behind the curtains of that bay window when she looked carefully about and then closed the door again. She repeated that performance three times; and finally I guess she was sure I had quit for the night, for she sneaked out and down the back stairs to the yard. I was right on her heels, as you saw; but I don't think she knew it."

"She's not running any chances, though, that she can avoid.—Look! Her taxi is stopping in front of that little cottage with the vines all over it." Odell bent forward and touched the chauffeur's shoulder. "Shoot past and on for a couple of blocks and then through to the next street. I think the grounds reach all the way back. We'll make a racket as though we were out on a joy ride."

The two operatives took their cue; and they whirled by to a chorus of cheerful yowls and snatches of song. Through a bumpy, unpaved side road they plowed their way, turning down once more on the back street, in silence now, with the engine barely humming.

"Here's the place," Odell announced. "Pull up and wait by that open lot there, where the empty roadster is stalled. Will you take a chance on putting out your own lights?"

"Surest thing you know!" the chauffeur responded with alacrity. "If there's liable to be any rough work and you want me, why, that's my middle name."

Odell thanked him, and with Miller and Smith at his heels pushed through the rank undergrowth of the neglected yard until they came to a narrow path which led to the back door of the vine-covered cottage. Save for a low light