No wonder he was puzzled, for as we have intimated, whoever had gone down the corridor had made not the smallest sound. Recollect that it was a little past midnight, that the school was plunged in slumber, and that, to the best of Clive's belief, he and Masters were the only two about the premises. Remember that the circumstances provided an intense stillness, and that at such times sounds usually inaudible come to the ear with certainty. He had heard something, he was sure.
"As if a fellow had a dressing-gown on and the gown were trailing on the ground," he told himself. "The merest whisper. It may have been a man's deep breathing. But there's not a sound now. Not a single sound."
But there was something else. There came the flicker of a light away to his right, a mere flicker, and then the same all-pervading darkness. Clive slid off in that direction at once, halted when he judged he had reached the correct position, and strained his ears and eyes to detect the author of that sudden glimmer. And what a job he had to be sure to drown the sound of his own breathing and his own thudding heart beats! That was the worst of such intense stillness, and of excitement, for he was excited.
"The chap took me by surprise," he muttered beneath his breath, as if by way of excuse. He struggled against the feeling of excitement, but failed hopelessly. His heart still thudded against his ribs, beating with unusual rapidity. And then, worse than all, a sudden tickling sensation at the back of his throat assailed him. He was going to cough. He was——
No. He beat the feeling down, and of a sudden once more had all his attention engaged elsewhere. For from a spot some ten feet to his right, from the centre of the inky darkness of the corridor, a jet of light swept across to the far wall. He could see the actual point from which it arose. There the beam glowed brightly, perhaps an inch and a half in depth. It spread itself gradually through the darkness, till it obtained much greater dimensions and finally settled on the brick and stone inner wall of the corridor in a wide ellipse of light. Silently it stole along the brickwork till it fell upon a door.
"The Head's entrance to his house. This is queer," Clive thought, while his excitement rose. Let us be brutally frank about this young fellow. He was no coward. He was noted for dash and courage at Ranleigh School. But, like every other fellow there, he was susceptible to outside influences. And here was one decidedly uncanny and out of the ordinary, one which affected him most strangely. Clive felt positive pain in his scalp. His hair bristled beneath the school cap which he had donned for this adventure. He felt almost scared. Raising his hand he thrust the fingers beneath his cap, and instantly the beam of light vanished. It was there one instant. It was gone the next. There was merely dense blackness, and silence.
"Phew!" Perspiration trickled over his brows. His palms were moist and clammy. He began to wish that Masters would turn up, only that would be awkward.
"Give the whole show away," he told himself. "This is beastly ghostly and uncanny, but I ain't going to be funked. There's something mighty suspicious here, and that beam comes from an electric hand light. Then there is someone operating it. Ghosts don't have such things. Don't need 'em."
The very thought tickled him vastly. It was queer at such a moment to be struck by the utter absurdity of the suggestion that a ghost should require a lamp, and should be so up-to-date as to have adopted an electric one. Still, the deathly silence gave a most undoubted ghostly appearance to the whole transaction, and we must excuse Clive if he was impressed by it.
"He ain't moved. Shall I show him up with my lamp?" he asked himself. "No, I'll wait. Ten to one this is the beggar we're after. But he's done nothing yet. I'm out to catch an incendiary, and if this is he, why, I sit tight till he's got to the business."