“Very well, sir,” the man answered, and continued to walk by our side. He was smoking a pipe, and as we neared the house he knocked out the ashes and placed it in his pocket.
“No dogs there, I hope?” Boyd said, addressing him.
“No, sir. None.”
I confess to feeling a thrill of excitement, for the business of “breaking and entering a dwelling-house” was entirely new to me. The Hampton Road is ill-lit, and after ten at night utterly deserted, therefore in our walk we met no one except the solitary policeman, who stood beneath a lamp and greeted Boyd with a low “All right, sir,” as we passed on towards The Hollies.
All was in darkness. Not a soul was about save ourselves and the policeman standing watchful and motionless beneath the street-lamp fifty yards away. The well-kept garden with its laurels, its monkey-trees and its old yews was shut off from the road by a high wall, in which was a pair of heavy iron gates giving entrance to the gravelled drive. These gates were locked and secured by a chain and formidable padlock, a fact which showed that to enter we must climb them. The houses on either side were of rather meaner order than The Hollies, and in one of them a light still showed in an upper window.
In order not to attract the occupiers of these houses we conversed in low whispers, and in obedience to the local detective’s suggestion climbed the gates one after another and carefully descended within the garden. On either side of the house extended walls some ten feet in height, with doors in them giving access to the rear of the premises, and again, guided by the plain-clothes man, we scaled this wall, a somewhat perilous process, it being spiked on the top. As it was, indeed, I made a serious rent in an almost new pair of trousers, much to Boyd’s amusement.
At last, when we were in the rear garden, our guide began foraging beneath a laurel bush and brought forth a dark lantern, a short, serviceable-looking jemmy, and a big bunch of skeleton keys.
“I examined the place this afternoon,” he explained. “This door is the only one locked from the outside, therefore if we can pick the lock we shall be able to enter and get away without leaving a trace.”
“Very well,” Boyd said impatiently. “Let’s get to work,” and taking the keys he went to the garden entrance and commenced work upon the lock, while his assistant lit and held the lantern.
Every effort, however, to open the lock proved a failure.