"To be sure, ma'am, to be sure," the valet replied. "I only wish I could ketch the man; but I'm afraid he's had time to get away."
Gus could not see the fierce manner in which the valet brandished his weapon as he spoke; but the words were enough. With a hare-like instinct, the boy rushed for the nearest covert. Between him and the door was the bed. Curtains hung at the head, the sheet was folded back, the large downy pillows, with frilled edges, were invitingly exposed. Straight at the bed dashed Gus.
As he slipped behind the curtain, his quick eyes saw an aperture at the back of the pillows which seemed to offer him a hiding-place. Quick as thought, he sprang up, and wriggled himself along till he lay, as small as possible, between the bolster and the wooden board at the head of the bedstead. Had he not been very thin and slight, he could not have worked himself into such a position without disarranging the bed. But with such eel-like dexterity did he move that when, a few minutes later, the armed force entered the room, the bed looked pretty much as the housemaid had left it before she went out.
The valet, poker in hand, advanced into the room, followed by Martha, who carried the tongs. Then came Miss Durrant, who had armed herself with a finely polished brass poker, one of the ornamental kind which rarely see actual service; next was cook, and Edith brought up the rear, because no one else was willing to come last, there being a general impression that if the burglar were passed by the van-guard, he would be likely to fall upon the rear.
The valet courageously looked under the bed and under the skirt of the dressing-table. At Miss Durrant's suggestion, he opened her wardrobe, and passed his hand through the dresses that hung there. Emboldened by his example, cook passed her hand cautiously over the surface of the feather-bed, but did not think of looking behind the pillows, though it did occur to her to look in the coal-box, which could not have sheltered a "Tom Thumb" of burglars.
"I can't help thinking it was nothing but an old cat," remarked Martha, keeping, in spite of this assertion, close to the side of their gallant protector.
"You think it a cat, do you?" replied cook, with a snort. "Well, all I can say is, I never knew before that you was so mighty afraid of cats. One would think you was a mouse."
The resources of Miss Durrant's room seeming to be exhausted, the band passed on to the next. Gus, who had hardly dared to breathe whilst they were in the room, drew a long sigh of relief as he heard them passing up the corridor.
Tramp, tramp, tramp went the procession, now in the servants' rooms, now in the attic, finally descending again to the lower regions. The valet, who had got out on the roof and examined the cistern, was certain that some living creature had fallen into it; but the splashes on the slates and the shattered plank gave no conclusive evidence as to the size and nature of the intruder. He readily adopted the idea suggested by Martha, and amused himself with twitting the cook with having mistaken a cat for a man.
The policeman, who arrived late at the scene of excitement, leaned towards the same opinion; and though he went round the grounds with his bull's-eye, failed to discover the ladder hidden amongst the shrubs, or to see any traces of the burglars.