to overplay his hand. "I'm sorry,"
he said, "but I think I'd better not. I've got some work to do
to-night. Perhaps I can drop in on Monday when Mr. Mifflin's away, and
put coal on the furnace for you, or something of that sort?"

Mrs. Mifflin laughed. "Surely!" she said. "You're welcome any time."
The door closed behind them, and Aubrey fell into a profound
melancholy. Deprived of the heavenly rhetoric of her eye, Gissing
Street seemed flat and dull.

It was still early--not quite ten o'clock--and it occurred to Aubrey
that if he was going to patrol the neighbourhood he had better fix its
details in his head. Hazlitt, the next street below the bookshop,
proved to be a quiet little byway, cheerfully lit with modest
dwellings. A few paces down Hazlitt Street a narrow cobbled alley ran
through to Wordsworth Avenue, passing between the back yards of Gissing
Street and Whittier Street. The alley was totally dark, but by
counting off the correct number of houses Aubrey identified the rear
entrance of the bookshop. He tried the yard gate cautiously, and found
it unlocked. Glancing in he could see a light in the kitchen window
and assumed that the cocoa was being brewed. Then a window glowed
upstairs, and he was thrilled to see Titania shining in the lamplight.
She moved to the window and pulled down the blind. For a moment he saw
her head and shoulders silhouetted against the curtain; then the light
went out.

Aubrey stood briefly in sentimental thought. If he only had a couple
of blankets, he mused, he could camp out here in Roger's back yard all
night. Surely no harm could come to the girl while he kept watch
beneath her casement! The idea was just fantastic enough to appeal to
him. Then, as he stood in the open gateway, he heard distant footfalls
coming down the alley, and a grumble of voices. Perhaps two policemen
on their rounds, he thought: it would be awkward to be surprised
skulking about back doors at this time of night. He slipped inside the
gate and closed it gently behind him, taking the precaution to slip the
bolt.

The footsteps came nearer, stumbling down the uneven cobbles in the
darkness. He stood still against the back fence. To his amazement the
men halted outside Mifflin's gate, and he heard the latch quietly
lifted.

"It's no use," said a voice--"the gate is locked. We must find some
other way, my friend."

Aubrey tingled to hear the rolling, throaty "r" in the last word.