Soon Bates and the other two men came up, and as I lay on the top of the wall, peeping over, I could hear their conversation.
“Gone up the chimney, have they?” said Bates. “Then they can’t escape: they will have to come down again sometime. I’ll tell you what it is, men: these are the poachers who have been making this smoke that has been puzzling everybody so much; they have found some secret chamber up the chimney here. I wonder what Sir Anthony will say when he hears who it is that has been stealing his pheasants so long.”
“He’ll prosecute ’em, sir; you may depend on it,” said one of the keepers. “He told me, only this morning, he didn’t care who it was, he’d prosecute ’em to the full extent of the law.”
“I hope he will; they deserve it—the young rascals. Look here, men——”
Bates and the three keepers fell to whispering together; I could no longer hear what was said. Presently they withdrew to either side of the fireplace and stood motionless, except that Bates occasionally rubbed his shins. It was plain that they expected that, if they kept quiet, we, supposing they had gone, would come down to be pounced upon.
I put my face over the opening of the chimney and gave a click with my tongue; Percy answered the signal; and then I whispered to him to come up. Soon his head appeared, and creeping out of the hole he pulled up the rope and laid it on the wall.
“Did you pull up the other rope?” I asked.
“Part way. I lodged it on one of the ledges below the passage. What are they doing down there?”
“Waiting for us to come down.”
We peered over the wall. Seemingly the enemy had already tired of waiting, for they were holding another whispered consultation, which resulted in the disappearance of two of the keepers into the fireplace. Presently we heard a muffled voice exclaim: