, behind which rose
a bank clad with scrub and surmounted by some gnarled and wind-crooked
firs.

"There's dashed little cover here," said Heritage.

"There's no muckle," Dougal assented. "But they canna see us from the
policies, and it's no' like there's anybody watchin' from the Hoose.
The danger is somebody on the other side, but we'll have to risk it.
Once among thae big stones we're safe. Are ye ready?"

Five minutes later Dickson found himself gasping in the lee of a
boulder, while Dougal was making a cast forward. The scout returned
with a hopeful report. "I think we're safe till we get into the
policies. There's a road that the auld folk made when ships used to
come here. Down there it's deeper than Clyde at the Broomielaw. Has
the auld yin got his wind yet? There's no time to waste."

Up that broken hillside they crawled, well in the cover of the tumbled
stones, till they reached a low wall which was the boundary of the
garden. The House was now behind them on their right rear, and as they
topped the crest they had a glimpse of an ancient dovecot and the ruins
of the old Huntingtower on the short thymy turf which ran seaward to
the cliffs. Dougal led them along a sunk fence which divided the downs
from the lawns behind the house, and, avoiding the stables, brought
them by devious ways to a thicket of rhododendrons and broom. On all
fours they travelled the length of the place, and came to the edge
where some forgotten gardeners had once tended a herbaceous border.
The border was now rank and wild, and, lying flat under the shade of an
azalea, and peering through the young spears of iris, Dickson and
Heritage regarded the north-western facade of the house.

The ground before them had been a sunken garden, from which a steep
wall, once covered with creepers and rock plants, rose to a long
verandah, which was pillared and open on that side; but at each end
built up half-way and glazed for the rest. There was a glass roof, and
inside untended shrubs sprawled in broken plaster vases.

"Ye maun bide here," said Dougal, "and no cheep above your breath.
Afore we dare to try that wall, I maun ken where Lean and Spittal and
Dobson are. I'm off to spy the policies." He glided out of sight
behind a clump of pampas grass.

For hours, so it seemed, Dickson was left to his own unpleasant
reflections. His body, prone on the moist earth, was fairly
comfortable, but his mind was ill at ease. The scramble