“Well, I’ll find out who they were and have them punished, too. Now, out this way.”
Curiously Don followed his captor out into the hall and up the big staircase to the second floor, down that hall and up a flight of stairs to the third floor. Coming to a door there Gates opened it and thrust Don inside, closing the door after him. A moment later and Don heard a key rattle in the lock. Then the sound of rapidly retreating footsteps came to his ears.
He attempted to move around the room and bumped into something sharp that poked into his waist. Striking a match that he found in his pocket, Don saw that he was in a billiard room and that he had bumped the table. Seeing a light switch on the wall he moved toward it and turned on the lights. Then he looked curiously around his prison.
There were no windows in the room, but a skylight gave it illumination in the daytime. If necessary Don was sure that he could jump from the table to the skylight and make his way to the roof, but he had no intention of trying it at present. Instead, he went to the door and tried it carefully, finding it locked.
“They won’t keep me in here long,” he thought grimly. “I’ll raise such a racket that he’ll be glad to let me out. But I wonder if that will be the best thing to do?”
He began to shake the door, to try its strength, and at last pressed against the lock with all his strength. Although that had no effect on the lock directly it had an unexpected outcome. There was a step out in the hall, and the key was turned in the lock. When the door was thrown open Don stared into the face of a butler.
He was the first one to recover himself. “Oh, thanks a lot for opening the door,” he said, carelessly, seeing his way out. “Someone must have turned the key in the lock.”
“But what—who are you, sir?” the surprised butler stammered.
“I’m an acquaintance of Mr. Gates,” said Don. “I came up here with him and he left me to go down stairs. Someone must have turned the lock while I was in here.”
“But, sir,” protested the butler. “No one has been past this door. I sleep in the next room and I came out before going to bed because I heard you rattle the door.”