was thundering at the door of the flat below. And
the fact that they knew where Alec lived adds to my suspicion of
Beauchamp. The landlady wisely let them in, and for a few minutes they
were busy searching the rooms. Then the noise of their feet was heard
on the wooden stair leading up to the garret, whereupon Mr Cupples
turned the poker in the fire, and said to Alec,

"Rin into that hole there, direckly."

He pointed with the red-hot poker to the door already mentioned as
partly sunk in the slope of the ceiling, and then stuck the poker in
the fire again. Alec pulled the door open, and entering closed it
behind him. The next moment, guided by the light from under it, the
foremost footsteps reached the door, and the same instant Mr Cupples
appeared in it with his glowing weapon in his hand. Faces with flashing
eyes filled the dark garret outside.

"What do ye want?" asked Mr Cupples.

"We want a resurrectioner 'at bides i' this hoose--a foul bane-pikin'
doctor," answered a huge, black-faced smith.

"What do ye want wi' _him_?"

"What are _ye_ stan'in' jawin' there for? Haud oot o' the gait. Gin he
bena in your box, what's the odds o' oor luikin' in't?"

"Haud a quaiet sough, my man," answered Cupples, raising the point of
the worn old weapon, the fervency of whose whiteness had already dimmed
to a dull scaly red, "or I s' lat ye ken' at I'm i' my ain hoose. My
certy! but this'll gang throu ye as gin ye war sae mony kegs o' saut
butter!"

And he gave a flourish with his rapier--the crowd yielding a step
before it--as he asked once more--

"What do ye want wi' him?"

"To ca the sowl oot o' the wame o' the deil's buckie o' him," said a
limping ostler.

"I s' pang the mou' o' him wi' the hip o' a corp," cried a pale-faced
painter, who seemed himself to belong to the injured fraternity of
corpses.

A volley of answers too horrible for record, both in themselves and in
the strange devilry of their garnish of oaths, followed. Mr Cupples did
not flinch a step from his post. But, alas! his fiery sword had by this
time darkened into an iron poker, and the might of its enchantment
vanished as the blackness usurped its glow. He was just going to throw
it away, and was stretching out his other hand for his grandfather's
broadsword, which he had put in the corner by the door ready to replace
it, when a long arm, with a fist at the end of it, darted from between
the heads in front of him, hurled him across the room, a