A grey soft hat was pulled down on the back of the man's head, concealing even the neck. In the dim light, in the secret silvery cavern, no details could be seen. And, though the man wore heavy boots and walked heavily, he made not a sound. All this went through Martin's head while the man took three steps.
"Hoy! There! Wait a minute!"
Martin ran forward. The air itself took form against him. His outstretched hands thumped into an invisible barrier which jarred him to the shoulder-bones and stopped him in his tracks.
It was a polished sheet of thick plate-glass: invisible, stretching across the whole corridor and cutting it in two. No wonder the man's steps had made no sound!
Martin, his hands against the glass, stood there for a moment and tried to think straight This wasn't a predicament: it was merely damned ludicrous. He was not in the Cretan labyrinth, or even in Pentecost Prison. He was in a trumpery two-by-four pavilion at a country fair, and yet as excited as though…
Whereupon, although the corridor was empty except for, Martin, a voice spoke. The voice had a note of slyness; It was not loud; it even whispered. The voice said:
"You had better leave, Mr. Drake. If you can."
Chapter 19
About a quarter of an hour before that voice spoke to Martin, there was at Brayle Manor a scene far more — wrenched with emotion, far deeper in the springs of human life.
Sophia, Dowager Countess of Brayle, almost staggered as she moved up the broad oak staircase in the dim house. Her fashionable hat was disarranged on the grey-white hair. The fashionable dress, also a little disarranged, did not now conceal her stoutness. From the limp fingers of one hand dangled a riding-crop. Nevertheless, most noticeable of all was the look of utter stupefaction in her eyes.