“There’s somebody inside your maze,” he said when that gentleman presently appeared on the scene in obedience to his summons.
“Nonsense!” was the reply. “How can there be anybody in there? I locked the maze up myself at closing time, and nobody has had possession of the key since.”
“Well,” persisted Mr. Ritchie, “I’ll swear I heard voices there anyhow, and I’m going to search the place.”
This he started to do, and as a preliminary, directly he got inside, he struck a match.
“Here! None of that, Mr. Ritchie, if you please,” cried Wieland. “To strike a light in there is against your own orders. Besides, if you burn my show down, what redress have I got?”
Ritchie, although inwardly fuming with rage, had to recognise the reasonableness of this, and he contented himself with groping about in the dark, and calling to the supposed intruder to come out.
For a while there was no response. Then suddenly, from the innermost recesses of the maze, a hoarse voice shouted: “Get out yourself. Who are you?”
“I’m Mr. Josiah Ritchie, the manager of the Aquarium,” answered “Uncle” wrathfully, “and I order you to come out immediately.”
“Oh, you go to hell,” was the polite rejoinder; whereat Ritchie came outside hurriedly, his face aflame with rage.
“There you are,” he cried, addressing Wieland. “I told you there was someone in there,” and he called a messenger boy, and ordered him to fetch the Aquarium policeman and fireman.