It was a peculiar sound, like the soft bang which is made by the closing

of a safe door. For a moment Drake paid no heed to it; then suddenly its

significance struck upon him. Lady Angleford was in the drawing-room.

Who could be at the safe?

He stepped outside the door, and waited for a second or two, then he

opened the door softly, and saw a man rising from his knees in front of

the safe. The man turned at the moment and stood with the case of

diamonds in his hand--two other cases bulged from his side pockets--his

eyes gleaming through his mask.

Now, in fiction the hero who is placed in this position always cries

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aloud for help, and instantly springs at the burglar; but in real life

the element of surprise has to be taken into account; and Drake was too

amazed at the moment to fling himself upon the thief. Besides, it is

your weak and timid man who immediately cries for help. Drake was

neither weak nor timid, and it would not occur to him to shriek for

assistance. So the two men stood motionless as statues, and glanced at

each other while you could count twenty. Then the burglar whipped a

revolver from his pocket and presented it.

"Stand out of my way!" he said gruffly, and disguising his voice, for

he knew how easily a voice can become a means of identification. "Better

stand out of my way, or, by God! I'll fire!"

Drake laughed, the short laugh of a strong man ridiculing the proposal

that he shall probably stand aside and permit a thief to pass with his

booty.

"Put down that thing," he said. "You know you can't fire; too much

noise. Put it down--and the cases. No? Very well!"

He sprang aside with one movement, and with the next went for the man.

Ted was really a skillful craftsman, and had taken the precaution to

fasten a string across the room, from the bed to the grate.

Drake's foot caught in it, and he went sprawling on his face.

Ted sprang over him, and gained the corridor. With a dexterity beyond

all praise, he switched off the remaining lights and then pushed up the

window and dropped, rather than climbed, down the ladder.

Drake was on his feet in a moment and out in the corridor in the next.

He had heard the window pushed up, and knew the point at which the man

had made his escape.

Even then he did not give the alarm, and he did not turn up the lights,

for he could see into the night better without them. He leaned out of

the window and peered into darkness, and distinguished two forms gliding

toward the shrubbery.




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