William laughed. He thought at first that Ketley was joking, but he soon saw that Ketley regarded the jug and bottle entrance with real suspicion. When pressed to explain, he told Journeyman that it wasn't that he was afraid of the place, he merely didn't like it. "There's some places that you likes better than others, ain't they?" Journeyman was obliged to confess that there were.
"Well, then, that's one of the places I don't like. Don't you hear a voice talking there, a soft, low voice, with a bit of a jeer in it?"
On another occasion he shaded his eyes and peered curiously into the left-hand corner.
"What are you looking at?" asked Journeyman.
"At nothing that you can see," Ketley answered; and he drank his whisky as if lost in consideration of grave and difficult things. A few weeks later they noticed that he always got as far from the jug and bottle entrance as possible, and he was afflicted with a long story concerning a danger that awaited him. "He's waiting; but nothing will happen if I don't go in there. He can't follow me; he is waiting for me to go to him."
"Then keep out of his way," said Journeyman. "You might ask your bloody friend if he can tell us anything about the Leger."
"I'm trying to keep out of his way, but he's always watching and a-beckoning of me."
"Can you see him now?" asked Stack.
"Yes," said Ketley; "he's a-sitting there, and he seems to say that if I don't come to him worse will happen."
"Don't say nothing to him," William whispered to Journeyman. "I don't think he's quite right in 'is 'ead; he's been losing a lot lately."