Chick followed his chief into a large room which looked more like a bedchamber of a hundred years ago than of to-day.
Instead of the light furniture to which people are accustomed now, with brass or mahogany bedstead and other articles to correspond, there was an immense four-poster, with mahogany cornices, from which depended thick hangings of purple velvet with lace lambrequins draped over them.
A small electric light in a ground-glass globe hung over a table where it would not shine in the face of an occupant of the bed, but which relieved the gloom of the great, shadowy apartment.
The man who might or might not be Howard Milmarsh lay asleep in the bed. His potations had stupefied him to such an extent that he slumbered heavily, his breath coming in long, stertorous snores, and he did not move.
Nick took from his pocket his electric flash, and, turning the light full into the face of the sleeper, shook him gently and continuously.
It required several seconds to bring the man to his waking senses, and even then he was only half-conscious. Lazily opening his eyes, he closed them quickly, for he had been blinded by the glaring eye of the flash light. When, after a pause, he opened them again, the light was gone.
“Hello! What’s this?” he mumbled. “I must have been dreaming!”
Satisfied that this was the explanation of the strange light he thought he had seen, Howard Milmarsh composed himself to drop asleep again, when a deep voice commanded him to “Awake!”
He started up in bed and rubbed his eyes.