lighted the great room where Evan had suffered his ordeal at the hands
of the Ikunahkatsi. It was in one of the back rooms on the same floor
that the chief had his sanctum, he told himself. All the windows of
the house were dark, but this did not prove that people were not within
and awake, for Evan remembered the heavy shutters inside the windows.

He waited for a minute or two, and then began to get restless. In fact
he itched for the glory of taking the chief single-handed. The letter
of instructions had suggested that the chief would be alone in the
building to-night, except for the old negress and the prisoner. And
Evan was armed now. If he could find some way to make an entrance
without giving an alarm, he believed it could be done.

He stole up to the front door on all fours. It was locked of course.
He went around to the back; there were two doors here, both locked. He
went from window to window. All of them had panes missing, but within
each window the heavy shutters were closed and barred. He thought of
cellar windows, sometimes they were forgotten. In certain places thick
clumps of sumach had sprung up close to the house. Pushing behind one
such clump, he stumbled on an old stone stair leading down. Once it
had been closed by inclined doors, but these had rotted and fallen in.
The steps led him into the cellar.

With the aid of his light he picked his way over the piles of rubbish
and around the brick piers. Immense brick arches supported the
chimneys of the house. They built more generously in those days. The
rats scuttled out of his way. In the centre of the space there was a
steep stair leading up. It looked sound. Pocketing his light, he
crept up step by step and with infinite care tried the door at the top.
It yielded! He was in!

All was dark and silent throughout the house. He judged that he must
be in the central hall. He dared not use his light now, but felt his
way towards the front. The sensation was not unlike that when he had
been led through the house blindfolded. He touched the edge of the
stairway, and guided himself to the foot. As he turned to mount, a
sound brought the heart into his throat.

He identified it, and smiled grimly. It was a human snore and it came
through the door on his left. This was the room where he had been
confined, and it was more than likely old Simeon Deaves was sleeping
there now.

He went up, stepping on the sides of the stair-trea