Presently she unlocked one of her trunks and took out a little white package with a red cross scored on it. Undoing the sealed waxed paper she uncovered several neatly cut strips of meat. She regarded them with disgust. It was by no means the first little white package she had opened since her arrival at Grey House, but none of the previous ones had been crossed with red.
She switched off the light and went towards the side window, slipped between the curtains and drew them close behind her. When her eyes were grown accustomed to the darkness, she raised the sash. Like the others in the house it worked easily, noiselessly. A bitter air from the snow-capped Argyll hills made her wish she had donned furs.
Crouching, she reached out and peered downwards. The darkness baffled her, but something had to be left to chance. She let fall a strip of meat, and closed the window—for about five minutes. Then she peered down again. A live thing was moving on the gravel. She let fall the rest of the meat, and a snuffling sound came up to her ears. Caw's Great Dane had lately been finding frequent tit-bits in that particular spot, and now he was making another tasty meal—his last.
Mrs. Lancaster closed the window and after washing her hands went back to the fire. It supplied all the light she required for the present. There was nothing that needed to be done for an hour. But she grew more and more restless, and before half the time had passed she was opening another of her trunks. From it she took that which in the doubtful light seemed a mere mass of silk, but which was later to resolve itself into a sort of ladder carefully rolled up and fitted with a steel clamp at the top. She placed the bundle behind the curtains of the side window, and returned to the trunk.
From a nest of soft materials she drew a wooden box about eight inches square. Gingerly she carried it to the couch, seated herself, and took off the lid. The removal of a quantity of cotton wool revealed a glass sphere of the size of an average orange, filled with a clear, colourless fluid. She let the sphere stay where it was, and after gazing at it awhile placed the box very cautiously on the mantel.
Feeling faintish, she got her smelling-salts and cologne and lay down on the couch. The half hour that followed was the longest she had ever spent, and yet she was not relieved when the clock tinkled nine. The fire had burned low, but she let it die….
Once more she lurked at the window—fearing one moment, hoping the next, that her message had not reached him in time, that he would not come—till another night, though she was aware that it must be now or never…. And at last, down below, a mere spark of light moved in the mirk.
Mrs. Lancaster was no weakling. The spark roused as though it had touched and scorched her. She cleared her mind for action. No useless hampering thoughts littered it now. Her intelligence reckoned nothing save the work on hand; its details she had by heart. She acted.
* * * * *
Bullard came from between the curtains white and breathing hard, but smiling. He had no head for climbing—and a loosely hung ladder of silken loops in the darkness is poor support to the nerves—but he had the will for anything that meant great gain.