“Course we can,” Gib cheerfully assured her. “Dick kin go in furst, you girls follow, an’ I’ll be rear guard.”
“You mean I can go in when I find an opening,” the city boy turned back to whisper. Somehow they just couldn’t bring themselves to talk out loud.
Nann held her lantern high and looked at the corner nearest where a crumbling wall upheld the roof. “There ought to be room to creep in over there,” she pointed, “if it weren’t for all that debris on the ground.”
“We’ll soon dispose of that,” Dick said, going to the spot and placing his flashlight on a rock that it might illumine their labors. The two boys fell to work with a will tossing away bricks and stones and broken pieces of plaster.
At last an opening large enough to be entered on hands and knees appeared. Dick cautioned the girls ta stay where they were until he had investigated. Dories gave a little startled cry when the boy disappeared, fearing that the wall or the roof might fall on him. After what seemed like a very long time, they heard a low whistle on the inside of the opening. Gib peered under and received whispered instructions from Dick. “It’s safe enough as far as I can see. Bring the girls in.” And so Dories crept through the opening, followed by Nann and Gib. Rising to their feet they found themselves in what had one time been a large and handsomely furnished drawing-room. A huge chandelier with dangling crystals still hung from the cross-beams, and in the night wind that entered from above they kept up a constant low jangling noise. Heavy pieces of mahogany furniture were tilted at strange angles where the rotting floor had given way.
“Watch your step, girls,” Dick, in the lead, turned to caution. “See, there’s a big hole ahead. I’ll go around it first to be sure that the boards will hold. Aha, yonder is a partition that is still standing. I wonder what room is beyond that.”
“Look out, Dick!” came in a low terrorized cry from Dories. The boy turned to see the girl, eyes wide and frightened, pointing toward a dark corner ahead. “There’s a man crouching over there. I’m sure of it! I saw his face.”
Instantly Dick swung the flashlight until it illumined the corner toward which Dories was still pointing. There was unmistakably a face looking at them with piercing dark eyes that were heavily overhung with shaggy grey brows.
For one terrorized moment the four held their breath. Even Dick and Gib were puzzled. Then, with an assumption of bravery, the former called: “Say, who are you? Come on out of there. We’re not here to harm anything.”
But the upper part of the face (that was all they could see) did not change expression, and so Dick advanced nearer. Then his relieved laughter pealed forth.