He closed the door quietly, and proceeded upstairs. Bream’s bedroom, he knew, was the one just off the next landing. He turned the handle quietly, and went in. Having done this, he coughed.
“Drop that pistol!” said the voice of Jane Hubbard immediately, with quiet severity. “I’ve got you covered!”
Mr. Bennett had no pistol, but he dropped the candle. It would have been a nice point to say whether he was more perturbed by the discovery that he had got into the wrong room, and that room a lady’s, or by the fact that the lady whose wrong room it was had pointed what appeared to be a small cannon at him over the foot of the bed. It was not, as a matter of fact, a cannon but the elephant gun, which Miss Hubbard carried with her everywhere—a girl’s best friend.
“My dear young lady!” he gasped.
On the five occasions during recent years on which men had entered her tent with the object of murdering her, Jane Hubbard had shot without making inquiries. What strange feminine weakness it was that had caused her to utter a challenge on this occasion, she could not have said. Probably it was due to the enervating effects of civilisation. She was glad now that she had done so, for, being awake and in full possession of her faculties, she perceived that the intruder, whoever he was, had no evil intentions.
“Who is it?” she asked.
“I don’t know how to apologise!”
“That’s all right! Let’s have a light.” A match flared in the darkness. Miss Hubbard lit her candle, and gazed at Mr. Bennett with quiet curiosity. “Walking in your sleep?” she inquired.
“No, no!”
“Not so loud! You’ll wake Mr. Hignett. He’s next door. That’s why I took this room, in case he was restless in the night.”