Approaching with due precaution, Lanyard peered in. The light came from a single electric bulb and a potbellied sheet-iron stove, glowing red. Near by, in a chair tipped against the wall, sat the watchman, corncob pipe in hand, head drooping, eyes closed, mouth ajar. A snore of the first magnitude seemed to vibrate the very walls. On the floor beside the chair stood a two-quart tin pail full of arid emptiness.
Dismissing further consideration of the watchman as a factor, satisfied that the entire neighbourhood as well was sound asleep, Lanyard darted up the plank walk that led into the building, then paused to get his bearings.
Effluvia of mortar and damp lumber saluted him in an uncanny place whose darkness was slightly qualified by a faint refracted glow from the low canopy of cloud and by equally dim shafts of diffused street light. There was more or less flooring of a temporary character over a sable gulf of cellars, and overhead a sullen, weeping sky cross-hatched with stark black ironwork.
With infinite patience Lanyard groped his way through that dark labyrinth to the foot of a ladder ascending an open shaft wherein a hoisting tackle dangled.
Here he stumbled over what he had been seeking, a great coil of one-inch hempen cable, from which he measured off roughly what he would require, if his calculations were correct, and something over. This length he re-coiled and slung over his shoulder: an awkward, weighty handicap. Nevertheless he began to climb.
Above the third level there was merely steel framework; he had somewhat more light to guide him, with a view of the north wall of the Seventy-ninth Street house, bright in the glare of avenue lamps.
The wall was absolutely blank.
At the seventh level the ladders ended. He stepped off upon a foot-wide beam, paused to make sure of his poise, and began to walk the girders with a sureness of foot any aviator might have envied.
At regular intervals he encountered uprights: between these he had to depend upon his sense of direction and equilibrium to guide him safely across those narrow walks of steel made slippery by rain.
But, thanks to forethought, his footwork was faultless: he wore shoes old, well-broken, very soft, flexible, and silent.