Ah! The beam flashed again, alighting on the tiled floor of the corridor, and stealing along it to the foot of the Head's door. It slowly climbed it till it reached the keyhole, concentrated itself upon that orifice, and then gradually grew smaller and more brilliant, while the point from which it originated approached the door ever so slowly, the beam shortening in proportion. Click! There was the faintest of sounds in the distance. The beam disappeared, strangled by the hand which operated the lamp.
"Masters making his round and coming along to meet me. He'll alarm this beggar," thought Clive. "Better get off and warn him. I'll get him to watch the far end of the corridor."
He went off like a ghost himself across the quad, entered the corridor by the open doorway below the entrance to East Dormitory, and halted outside the Bursar's office. Yes, there was the gentle slither of an almost noiseless footfall. Clive whistled gently.
"That you, Masters?" he asked in a hoarse whisper.
"Yes. What's up? You've seen something?"
"Just now. The fellow's got an electric lamp, and he's along there in the corridor. I'm not sure that he's our man, and I came back here to warn you not to make a sound. Look here, watch along there by the steps leading to the washing rooms. I've just thought this beggar may be an outsider who breaks in, or makes his way into the school by the back doors. You'd catch him at the turn of the corridor, and in any case you'd be within hearing and I could call you. That right?"
"I'm off. Yell if you want me," answered Masters. "Look out in case the fellow's armed. George! I never thought of that possibility of a man getting into the school from outside and doing this firing business. Hope it'll turn out so. Ranleigh don't want such scum about the school."
He went off without another word, while Clive slid into the quad again and stole along by the corridor windows. In a little while, having used the greatest caution, he had reached the spot he had stood in before, and straightway leaned against one of the barred windows and stared in. There was not a sound. No beam of light helped him to discover the whereabouts of the ghostly stranger parading the corridor.
"Gone! Slipped off on hearing that sound," Clive told himself. "Bad luck to it! He's beaten us again."
He fingered his own electric lamp, with which Masters was also provided.