f the neighboring
buildings, that there was a courtyard at the rear of the darkened house,
accessible through a narrow passageway at the side. As he studied the
situation he kept moving to avoid observation, and presently, at a moment
when he was quite alone in the street, walked rapidly to the house
Chauvenet had entered.

Gentlemen in search of adventures do well to avoid the continental wall.
Mr. Armitage brushed the glass from the top with his hat. It jingled
softly within under cover of the rain-drip. The plaster had crumbled from
the bricks in spots, giving a foot its opportunity, and Mr. Armitage drew
himself to the top and dropped within. The front door and windows stared
at him blankly, and he committed his fortunes to the bricked passageway.
The rain was now coming down in earnest, and at the rear of the house
water had begun to drip noisily into an iron spout. The electric lights
from neighboring streets made a kind of twilight even in the darkened
court, and Armitage threaded his way among a network of clothes-lines to
the rear wall and viewed the premises. He knew his Geneva from many
previous visits; the quarter was undeniably respectable; and there is, to
be sure, no reason why the blinds of a house should not be carefully
drawn at nightfall at the pleasure of the occupants. The whole lower
floor seemed utterly deserted; only at one point on the third floor was
there any sign of light, and this the merest hint.

The increasing fall of rain did not encourage loitering in the wet
courtyard, where the downspout now rattled dolorously, and Armitage
crossed the court and further assured himself that the lower floor was
dark and silent. Balconies were bracketed against the wall at the second
and third stories, and the slight iron ladder leading thither terminated
a foot above his head. John Armitage was fully aware that his position,
if discovered, was, to say the least, untenable; but he was secure from
observation by police, and he assumed that the occupants of the house
were probably too deeply engrossed with their affairs to waste much time
on what might happen without. Armitage sprang up and caught the lowest
round of the ladder, and in a moment his tall figure was a dark blur
against the wall as he crept warily upward. The rear rooms of the second
story were as dark and quiet as those below. Armitage continued to the
third story, where a door, as well as several windows, gave upon the
balcony; and he fou