“Nope.”
“Holy Smoke! Framed, hah?”
“Sorta.”
“If I could lay my mitts on the guy what....”
“Aw, forget it, Nickie,” Skippy said, rising. “When we get away we’ll talk about it, huh? Gee whiz, I’m here an’ so we gotta be thinkin’ bout gettin’ out quick’s we can.”
They went hopefully upstairs. Armed with a small kitchen knife Nickie started operations at the keyhole of the room which Frost and Devlin occupied but it was late that afternoon when it yielded.
They burst into this private and mysterious sanctum with cries of joy, then stopped a little beyond the threshold and surveyed the room with a feeling of disappointment. It was furnished little better than their room and aside from an old iron bed, there was a single chair, a trunk, and a cracked mirror which hung over the dilapidated writing table.
There were two windows, barred and shuttered like the rest of the house. Skippy noticed that, then walked to the far end of the room and opened a closet door.
“A ladder, Nickie!” he exclaimed, joyfully. “I betcha it’s a ladder for the attic!”
“Yeah, an’ what we gonna do up in the attic, hah, kid?” Nickie asked. “Even if there wasn’t no bars to them winders up there, what’d we do, hah?”