"
"Well?" I said.
"Well," he answered, "I jolly well have. You just come with me,"
and before I could speak he had turned tail once more and whisked
through the blue dark into the moat or basement of the house. I
followed almost before I made any decision.
When we got down into the area I felt indescribably foolish
literally, as the saying is, in a hole. There was nothing but a
closed door, shuttered windows, the steps down which we had come,
the ridiculous well in which I found myself, and the ridiculous
man who had brought me there, and who stood there with dancing
eyes. I was just about to turn back when Rupert caught me by the
elbow.
"Just listen to that," he said, and keeping my coat gripped in his
right hand, he rapped with the knuckles of his left on the shutters
of the basement window. His air was so definite that I paused and
even inclined my head for a moment towards it. From inside was
coming the murmur of an unmistakable human voice.
"Have you been talking to somebody inside?" I asked suddenly,
turning to Rupert.
"No, I haven't," he replied, with a grim smile, "but I should very
much like to. Do you know what somebody is saying in there?"
"No, of course not," I replied.
"Then I recommend you to listen," said Rupert sharply.
In the dead silence of the aristocratic street at evening, I stood
a moment and listened.
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