Jane did not drop the chair with a crash, neither did Willoughby Luttrell’s picture fall down, nor did a mouse run over her foot. She passed through the panelled door, shut it behind her, groped her way to the foot of the steps, and lighted the candle. It was then that the cheering thought that she might perhaps encounter Henry came to her, only to fade as she remembered how long past midnight it now was. However, if she had not Henry she had at least a light. It is much harder to be brave in the pitch dark even when, as in the present case, the darkness is really a protection.
Jane walked quite blithely up the second passage on the left until she came to the point where she knew that she must put the light out again. Molloy might be awake. She blew out her candle and began to feel her way forward. She came to the corner, and passed it. Moving very slowly and cautiously, she crept up to the steel gate and stood with her fingertips on it, listening, and thinking hard. She could feel that the door was ajar. That struck her as strange, very strange. If there ever was a man badly scared, Molloy was that man when she had said that the secret of the passages was not confined to himself and Ember. Yet he had gone to sleep leaving the gate ajar. Had he? Jane’s mind gave her a clear and definite answer. He hadn’t, he wouldn’t. She had been so sure that the gate would be shut, so ready with her plan. She was going to unfold the papers, push them between the bars, and jerk them as far across the room as possible. Molloy might think they had fallen from the bench, or, if he had his doubts, might well wish to avoid letting Ember know that Jane had been in the laboratory. All this she had so present in her thought, that to feel the gate give to her hand staggered her and set her shaking. She quieted herself and listened intently. Not a sound.
She did not somehow fancy that Molloy would be a quiet sleeper. She had anticipated snores of a certain rich bass quality. Here was silence in which one might have heard an infant draw its breath, a silence undisturbed, inviolate.
It was not only the silence which spoke to Jane. That odd, dim, only half-understood sense which some people possess, clamoured to her that the place was empty. As she stood there, and the seconds dragged into minutes, this sense became so insistent that she found herself resolving to act in obedience to its dictates.
She pushed the gate and heard the alarm ring. With all her ears she listened for the sound of a man stirring, waking, and starting up. At the first movement she would have been away, and Molloy, new roused from sleep, would never have caught sight of her. There was no movement. The bell went on ringing, a little continuous trickle of metallic sound, not loud but as confusing as the buzzing of a mosquito.
Jane switched on the light, slipped round the gate, and closed it. The bell stopped ringing. The jarred silence settled slowly, as dust settles when it has been stirred. There was no one there. The unshaded light showed every corner of the chamber. Molloy’s bag was gone. Like a flick in the face came certainty. “He’s gone. Molloy’s gone too.”
Slowly, almost mechanically, Jane extracted the rolled-up lists from her stocking. She was still holding the unlighted candle in her left hand. The lists bothered her. She moved towards the bench to put them down, but first she laid the candle carefully on its side so as not to stub the wick, and, sitting down, began to smooth the papers out upon her knee. It was whilst she was doing this that she saw the note.
It lay on the end of the bench propped up against a book. It was addressed to Jeffrey Ember, Esquire. The capital E’s were magnificent flourishes; an underlining like an ornamental scroll supported the superscription. Jane, like other well-brought-up people, was not in the habit of opening letters not addressed to herself. It may be said, however, that no solitary scruple so much as raised its head on this occasion. She tore open the tough linen envelope, and unfolded a lordly sheet. Molloy wrote a good, bold hand and legible withal. Every word stood clear.
“My dear Ember,—I’m off. The place is getting altogether too crowded. I’ve seen Renata, and she tells me that there are two men use the passages. One has a beard, but she couldn’t tell me their names or describe them further. She knows all about the passages herself. She confessed to having found them through following Number One. She has also seen you come in and go out. I don’t think this place is very healthy, so I’m making my get-away whilst I can. Drop the whole thing and get out quick is what I advise. I’m staunch, as you’ll find. Why did you take the lists after saying you’d leave them for me to look through? I’ll not work with a man that doesn’t trust me. You can write me at the old place.”
The letter was signed with a large Roman three. It appeared that Mr. Molloy was more careful over his own identity than over that of Mr. Jeffrey Ember.