with their backs against a thin, hollow-sounding partition. The journey was not without incident. As they felt their way over the loose and sometimes widely separated boards laid down to protect the laths and plaster of the ceiling below, his knee slipped off and before he could prevent it, his foot struck the lathing with considerable force.
"Clumsy ass!" he muttered.
After a long time, she said to him,—a little pathetically:
"I hope M. Mirabeau doesn't forget we are up here."
"I should hope not," he said fervently. "Mrs. Millidew is going out to dinner this evening. I'd—"
"Oh-h!" she whispered tensely. "Look!"
A thin streak of light appeared in front of them. Fascinated, they watched it widen, slowly,—relentlessly.
The trap-door was being raised from below. A hand and arm came into view,—the propelling power.
"Is that you, de Bosky?" called out Trotter, in a penetrating whisper.
Abruptly the trap flew wide open and dropped back on the scantlings with a bang.
The head and shoulders of a man,—a bald-headed man, at that,—rose quickly above the ledge, and an instant later a lighted lantern followed.
"Oh, dear!" murmured Lady Jane, aghast. "It—it isn't Mr. de Bosky, Eric. It's that man."
"I beg your pardon. Lord Temple," said Mr. Alfred Chambers, setting the lantern down in order to brush the dust off of his hands. "Are you there?"
"What is the meaning of this, sir?" demanded the
