He turned her round and flashed the light forward. There was the car, which had been backed into the long shed. ‘We can perch on the step or running-board or whatever they call it, or we can get inside and be snug and talk it all out over the whisky. Just a minute,’ he added, moving forward. ‘I’ll switch on the lights to make it cosier. Only the dims though, because it’s Waverton’s electricity, not mine. There you are.’
‘We’ll sit inside,’ she decided.
‘Right you are. Front or back?’ he enquired, bowing and waving a hand towards the two doors.
She laughed. He was turning it all into fun again. ‘Oh, the back!’ she cried. He held open the door and she climbed in and settled herself happily on the cushions. He sat down by her side and began to unscrew the flask.
‘So they’ve shut us out, eh?’ He was pouring the whisky into the little cup. ‘Well, that’s nothing new, is it? We’re always being shut out.’
‘I’m not.’ She took the cup he offered.
He laughed. ‘Aren’t you? I am. Drink up, and then begin at the beginning and tell me all about it. Wait, though, I’ll have a drink first. I don’t suppose there’s anything in it, I mean the business of the lights and the door, of course, but there might be, there’s just a chance. If there were, it would be something horrible. Well, I drink your health, Gladys.’ He drained the cup. ‘I hope you don’t mind my calling you that, as between fellow adventurers, you know, shut out, lost in the dark, draining the last flask.’
‘No, I don’t mind. I like it.’ She felt warm now, snuggling in the seat and with the tiny fire of whisky somewhere inside her; and she found herself leaning against him a little, discovering a certain comfort in the suggestion of his neighbouring solidity. ‘But what do you mean by your something horrible?’ she went on to ask. ‘Are you trying to frighten me?’
He was more serious now, though not entirely so. ‘No, I’m not. I tell you I don’t suppose there’s anything in it. But, I repeat, if there were, it would be something horrible. What I mean is, that this house we’ve crept into out of the dark might be all right—that is, so far as we’re concerned, just for to-night, we’ll say—and probably will be, but it’s very queer, and if it goes wrong, it’ll go wrong very badly. I feel it in my bones. Once off the track and there’ll be something hellish let loose. You see, I’ve been brooding over it a bit, and I know more about it than you do.’
‘You’re making it up,’ she cried. ‘You don’t know any more than I do. You’re trying to work it all up into something very exciting, just to pass the time. I know you.’