ness Gubblum was roused to
sudden wakefulness. There was a noise as of heavy shuffling feet outside
his door. The peddler raised himself and listened.

"Too dark in this corner," said a voice. "Get a light."

Gubblum crept out of bed, held his head to the door, and listened.

There were retreating steps. Then the man who had spoken before spoke
again. "Quick, there! we must catch the train at eleven fifteen."

The voice pealed in Gubblum's memory. He knew it. It was the voice of
the last man he should have looked for in this house--Hugh Ritson.

Presently the footsteps approached, and thin fingers of light shot over
Gubblum's head into his dark room. He looked up at the door. Three small
round holes had been pierced into the styles for ventilation.

"Put the candle on the floor and take the feet--I'll go up first," said
the same voice.

Gubblum raised himself on tiptoe and tried to peer through the
perforations. He was too small a man to see through. There was a chair
by the side of his bed, and his extinguished candle stood on it. He
removed the candlestick, lifted the chair cautiously, placed its back to
the door, and mounted it. Then he saw all.

There were two men, and he knew both--the brothers Ritson. Ah! had he
not said that Paul Ritson kept this inn? "I'll shut up the whole boilin'
of 'em next time," thought the peddler, "Wait! what are they lugging
into the pigeon loft?"

"Easy!--damme, but the fence is a weight!"

It was the hoarse voice of the other man. The candle was behind him and
on the floor. It cast its light on his back. "If I could no'but get a
blink frae the cannel, I'd see what's atween them," thought Gubblum.

The men with their burden were now at the top of the ladder.

"Twist about, and go in sideways," muttered the voice first heard.

The man below twisted. This movement brought the full light of the
candle on to the faces of all three.

"Lord A'mighty, whativer's this?" Gubblum thought.

The burden was a man's body. But it was the face that startled the
peddler--the face of Paul Ritson.

Gubblum's eyes passed over the group in one quick glance. He saw two
Paul Ritsons there, and one of them lay as still as the dead.

A minute more of awful tension, and the door of the loft above was
slammed and shut, the heavy feet of the two men descended the ladder
quickly, and went down the stairs into the bar.

Gubblum listened as if with every sense. He knew that the outer door to
the