I waited about a quarter of an hour without making any attempt to climb over the fence. I reflected that if my suspicions were correct, I must use every precaution. At the end of a quarter of an hour I crept cautiously over the fence and made my way towards the house.
Still all was dark. I carefully examined the ground around the two stunted trees I have mentioned, and presently I caught sight of something which set my heart beating violently. I was on the point of making a closer examination of what I had already seen, when a ray of light shone from one of the windows and I could hear the sound of voices. Again looking around me eagerly, I saw what looked like a large clump of rhododendron bushes. These offered me not only a hiding-place, but a post of observation. I had scarcely crept between the leaves when the door of John Liddicoat's house opened and two people came out. They were the man and the woman whom I had seen that morning.
Almost at the same time the moon rose behind a distant hill, and a few minutes later the garden was flooded with its silvery light.
"Have you got it all?" It was a woman who spoke.
"Yes, all except ..." and I could not catch the last word.
"You bring it, will you?"
They made their way towards the stunted trees, where they dropped the things they had brought. Then the man left the woman and appeared a little later bearing a light ladder.
I saw the man place his ladder against the tree and mount it, carrying something with him, what it was I could not tell. The moon had now risen high enough to enable me to see more plainly and to show me that the two worked swiftly and dexterously, as though they were accustomed to their work. Presently they had evidently finished, for they stood still and waited for something.
"I do not expect we shall get anything to-night." It was the woman who spoke.
"There is no knowing," replied the man; "besides, we have our orders. It is a calm night, too."