of which only one was now occupied. Here the Wragges lived their strange subterranean life of bickerings, of mutual suspicion, of occasional amorousness, such as Wake had once surprised them in.
As soon as their steps were heard by Rags he appeared in the doorway of the kitchen, the stub of a cigarette glowing against his pallid little face.
"Yes, Mr. W'iteoak?" he inquired. "Were you wanting me, sir?"
"Fetch a candle, Rags. I'm after a bottle."
The light of sympathy now brightened the cockney's face. "Right you are, sir," he said, and, dropping the cigarette stub to the brick floor, he turned back to the kitchen, reappearing in a moment with a candle in a battered brass candlestick. They had a glimpse of Mrs. Wragge, rising from the table at which she had been eating, and assuming an attitude of deference, her face as much like the rising sun as her lord's resembled the waning moon.
With Rags leading the way, the three passed in Indian file along a narrow passage that ended in a heavy padlocked door. Here Renny inserted the key, and the door, dragging stubbornly, was pushed open. Mingled with the penetrating chill were the odours of ale and spirits. The candlelight discovered what was apparently a well-stocked though untidily arranged cellar, but in truth the bottles and containers were mostly empties, which, in accordance with the negligence characteristic of the family, had never been returned.
Renny's red-brown eyes roved speculatively over the shelves. A cobweb, hanging from a rafter, had been swept off by his head, and was now draped over one ear. He whistled through his teeth with the sweet concentration of an ostler grooming a horse.
Wakefield, meanwhile, had espied an old wicker fishing basket pushed under the lowest of a tier of shelves. He dragged it forth and saw in the candlelight three dark squatty bottles, cobwebbed, leaning toward each other as though in elfin conspiracy. A liquid clucking sound came from them as they were disturbed, and, as he
