I little relished the prospect of waiting in that
swamp-like spot, but since no alternative presented
itself I accepted the inevitable. For close upon
an hour we stood watching the red window. No
sound of bird, beast, or man disturbed our vigil;
in fact, it would appear that the very insects shunned
the neighbourhood of Hassan of Aleppo. But the
red light still shone out.
“We must risk it!” said Carneta steadily.
“There are French windows opening on to that
verandah. Ten yards farther around the bushes
come right up to the wall of the house. We’ll
go that way and around by the other wing on to the
verandah.”
Any action was preferable to this nerve-sapping delay,
and with a determination to shoot, and shoot to kill,
any one who opposed our entrance, I passed through
the bushes and, with Carneta, rounded the southern
border of that silent house and slipped quietly on
to the verandah.
Kneeling, Carneta opened the knapsack. My eyes
were growing accustomed to the darkness, and I was
just able to see her deft hands at work upon the fastenings.
She made no noise, and I watched her with an ever-growing
wonder. A female burglar is a personage difficult
to imagine. Certainly, no one ever could have
suspected this girl with the violet eyes of being an
expert crackswoman; but of her efficiency there could
be no question. I think I had never witnessed
a more amazing spectacle than that of this cultured
girl manipulating the tools of the house breaker with
her slim white fingers.
Suddenly she turned and clutched my arm.
“The windows are not fastened!” she whispered.
A strange courage came to me—perhaps that
of desperation. For, ignoring the ominous circumstance,
I pushed open the nearest window and stepped into
the room beyond! A hissing breath from Carneta
acknowledged my performance, and she entered close
behind me, silent in her rubber-soled shoes.
For one thrilling moment we stood listening.
Then came the white beam from the electric lamp to
cut through the surrounding blackness.
The room was totally unfurnished!
THE POOL OF DEATH
Not a sound broke the stillness of the Gate House.
It was the most eerily silent place in which I had
ever found myself. Out into the corridor we
went, noiselessly. It was stripped, uncarpeted.
Three doors we passed, two upon the left and one upon
the right. We tried them all. All were
unfastened, and the rooms into which they opened bare
and deserted. Then we came upon a short, descending
stair, at its foot a massive oaken door.
Carneta glided down, noiseless as a ghost, and to
one of the blackened panels applied an ingenious little
instrument which she carried in her knapsack.
It was not unlike a stethoscope; and as I watched
her listening, by means of this arrangement, for any
sound beyond the oaken door, I reflected how almost
every advance made by science places a new tool in
the hand of the criminal.
