an ordinary room, rather small, rather mean, rather shabby, with an ugly
wallpaper and ugly pictures in ugly frames. Thrown over a chair was a
man's evening-dress jacket. The door was closed. Prince Aribert turned
the knob, but he could not open it.

'It's locked,' he said. 'Evidently they know we're here.'

'Nonsense,' said Racksole brusquely; 'how can they know?' And, taking
hold of the knob, he violently shook the door, and it opened. 'I told
you it wasn't locked,' he added, and this small success of opening the
door seemed to steady the man. It was a curious psychological effect,
this terrorizing (for it amounted to that) of two courageous full-grown
men by the mere apparition of a helpless creature in a cellar. Gradually
they both recovered from it. The next moment they were out in the
passage which led to the front door of the house. The front door stood
open. They looked into the street, up and down, but there was not a soul
in sight. The street, lighted by three gas-lamps only, seemed strangely
sinister and mysterious.

'She has gone, that's clear,' said Racksole, meaning the woman with the
red hat.

'And Miss Spencer after her, do you think?' questioned Aribert.

'No. She would stay. She would never dare to leave. Let us find the
cellar steps.'

The cellar steps were happily not difficult to discover, for in moving
a pace backwards Prince Aribert had a narrow escape of precipitating
himself to the bottom of them. The lantern showed that they were built
on a curve.

Silently Racksole resumed possession of the lantern and went first, the
Prince close behind him. At the foot was a short passage, and in this
passage crouched the figure of a woman. Her eyes threw back the rays
of the lantern, shining like a cat's at midnight. Then, as the men went
nearer, they saw that it was Miss Spencer who barred their way. She
seemed half to kneel on the stone floor, and in one hand she held what
at first appeared to be a dagger, but which proved to be nothing more
romantic than a rather long bread-knife.

'I heard you, I heard you,' she exclaimed. 'Get back; you mustn't come
here.'

There was a desperate and dangerous look on her face, and her form shook
with scarcely controlled passionate energy.

'Now see here, Miss Spencer,' Racksole said calmly, 'I guess we've had
enough of this fandango. You'd better get up and clear out, or we'll
just have to drag you off.'

He went calmly up to her, the lantern in his hand.