“Take out the limousine, Arthur,” he suggested. “It’ll hold the lot of us—and the glass will give us good cover.”
Wendover smiled at the return of Ernest’s caution, though he admitted that the choice was sound enough. They hurried to the garage and Arthur drove them down to the Maze.
Once there, Ernest seemed to feel that he had perhaps been over-courageous.
“Somebody ought to look after the car,” he suggested. “If we leave it here the fellow may steal up and go off with it, suppose he is lurking about. And where should we be then? He’d have got clean away and left us standing. I think I’d better sit in the car while you hunt about, and then we’ll know. . . .”
At the sight of the open contempt on Sir Clinton’s face, he let his proposal die away before it was completed, and crawled reluctantly out of the car with the others. He even made a show of eagerness and led the way to the Maze entrance.
“You’re off the line a bit, uncle,” Arthur pointed out.
“I can’t see very well in the dark,” Ernest complained. “And this grass is simply soaked with dew. I’ve got my feet all wet. Such a nuisance. . . .”
He tripped over something and came heavily to the ground. A heart-felt oath reached their ears.
“I’m wet all down the front, now,” Ernest wailed. “I fell over some damned thing or other and I’ve hurt my toe. I hope it hasn’t split the nail. What is this thing, damn it?”
He seemed to be feeling about in the dark.