Following this rather curious direction, Clifford went out by the back door of the house, lifted the lid, admiring the ingenuity by which the cellar was concealed, and began to descend the wooden steps into the darkness below. The Colonel had provided him with a candle, but this was suddenly extinguished as he reached the bottom step, and at the same moment he became aware that he was not alone.
Involuntarily he uttered a little cry. A hand, the little, soft and slender hand which he remembered so vividly, but which he had never before identified, was placed quickly on his mouth.
“Hello!” they heard a rough man’s voice cry, muffled as it came down into the earth from the garden above.
And Clifford heard a soft whisper in his own ear:
“The policeman! Send him away on some pretext. I only want a moment, just one moment!”
The young man shuddered. Although he had no fear that Miss Bostal would do him any harm, there was something uncanny about the idea of being left alone with a murderess, deep down in the bowels of the earth, in the grasp of the little hands that had done such deadly work.
The policeman’s voice startled them both. He flashed his lantern down into the cellar, but already Miss Bostal had released Clifford and hidden herself in the corner behind the steps.
“Hello! Who’s that down there? Is it you, Mr. King?”
“Yes,” said Clifford. “I’m getting some coal. Would you ask the Colonel for a scoop, or a shovel, or something to get it up by?”
The man flashed his lantern round the cellar once more, and answered: