"That does not matter," responded Brian. "Look here; but do not speak."
He felt in the darkness for one of the panels of the door. Evidently he knew that there was some hidden spring. The panel suddenly flew back, leaving a space of two feet square, through which it was easy for Brian to insert his hand and arm, draw back a bolt, and turn the key which had been left in the lock. It was a door which he and Richard had known of old. They had kept the secret, however, to themselves; and it was possible that Hugo had never learned it. Even Mr. Colquhoun uttered a faint inarticulate murmur of surprise.
The door was open before them, but they were still standing outside in the wet shrubbery, their feet on the damp grass, the evergreens trickling water in their faces, when an unexpected sound fell upon their ears.
Somewhere, in another part of the building—probably in the front of the house—one of the upper windows was thrown violently open. Then a woman's voice, raised in shrill tones of fear or pain, rang out between the fitful gusts of wind and rain.
"Help! Help! Help!"
There was no time to lose. The four men threw caution to the winds, and dashed headlong into the winding passages of the dark old house.
When Rupert Vivian drove away from Netherglen, Kitty stood for some time in the lane where they had been walking, and gazed after him with painful, anxious interest. The dog-cart was well out of sight before she turned, with a heavy sigh, preparing herself to walk back to the house. And then, for the first time, she became aware that her husband was standing at some little distance from her, and was coolly watching her, with folded arms and an evil smile upon his face.
"I have been wondering how long you meant to stand there, watching Vivian drive away," he said, advancing slowly to meet her. "Did you ask him about his wife?"
Kitty thought of her conversation with Rupert at Strathleckie—a conversation of which she had kept Hugo in ignorance—and coloured vividly.