“I know,” said Dick cautiously, “that it had something to do with your father’s—disappearance.”
Freda shivered at the word.
“You know more than that?” she said hoarsely.
“Perhaps. But I swear I can’t tell you what I know, so don’t ask me.”
For a minute there was dead silence, as they stood face to face, but scarcely able to see each other in the gathering darkness. Suddenly both were startled by the sound of a man’s hoarse voice, muffled by distance, which seemed to come from behind the door, through which Dick had entered.
CHAPTER XX.
At first both Dick and Freda listened to the faint sounds in silence. Then Dick spoke.
“They’ve come back. I sha’n’t be able to get out that way,” he said.
“Why should you? I can let you out by the front-gate.”
“But—I don’t want to be seen,” he said. “If Captain Mulgrave were to see me——”