you know. I'm going to ask you a direct question, Alfred, and I should like the truth, please. How much were you paid for leaving Chimneys?'
Alfred looked twice round the cornice as though seeking for inspirations, swallowed three or four times, and then took the inevitable course of a weak will opposed to a strong one.
'It was this way, your ladyship. Mr. Mosgorovsky, he come with a party to visit Chimneys on one of the show days. Mr. Tredwell, he was indisposed like – an ingrowing toe-nail as a matter of fact – so it fell to me to show the parties over. At the end of the tour, Mr. Mosgorovsky, he stays behind the rest, and after giving me something handsome, he falls into conversation.'
'Yes,' said Bundle encouragingly.
'And the long and the short of it was,' said Alfred, with a sudden acceleration of his narrative, 'that he offers me a hundred pounds down to leave that instant minute and to look after this here club. He wanted someone as was used to the best families – to give the place a tone, as he put it. And, well, it seemed flying in the face of providence to refuse – let along that the wages I get here are just three times what they were as second footman.'
'A hundred pounds,' said Bundle. 'That's a very large sum, Alfred. Did they say anything about who was to fill your place at Chimneys?'
'I demurred a bit, my lady, about leaving at once. As I pointed out, it wasn't usual and might cause inconvenience. But Mr. Mosgorovsky he knew of a young chap – been in good service and ready to come any minute. So I mentioned his name to Mr. Tredwell and everything was settled pleasant like.'
Bundle nodded. Her own suspicions had been correct and the modus operandi was much as she had thought it to be. She essayed a further inquiry.
'Who is Mr. Mosgorovsky?'
'Gentleman as runs this club. Russian gentleman. A very clever gentleman too.'
Bundle abandoned the getting of information for the moment and proceeded to other matters.
'A hundred pounds is a very large sum of money, Alfred.'
'Larger than I ever handled, my lady,' said Alfred with simple candour.
'Did you never suspect that there was something wrong?'
'Wrong, my lady?'
'Yes. I'm not talking about the gambling. I mean something far more serious. You don't want to be sent to penal servitude, do you, Alfred?'
'Oh, Lord! my lady, you don't mean it?'
'I was at Scotland Yard the day before yesterday,' said Bundle impressively. 'I heard some very curious things. I want you to help me, Alfred, and if you do, well – if things go wrong, I'll put in a good word for you.'
'Anything I can do, I shall be only too pleased, my lady. I mean, I would anyway.'
'Well, first,' said Bundle, 'I want to go all over this place – from top to bottom.'
Accompanied by a mystified and scared Alfred, she made a very thorough tour of inspection. Nothing struck her eye till she came to the gaming room. There she noticed an inconspicuous door in a corner, and the door was locked.
Alfred explained readily.
'That's used as a getaway, your ladyship. There's a room and a door on to a staircase what comes out in the next street. That's the way the gentry goes when there's a raid.'
'But don't the police know about it?'
'It's a cunning door, you see, my lady. Looks like a cupboard, that's all.'
Bundle felt a rising excitement.
'I must get in here,' she said.
Alfred shook his head.
'You can't, my lady; Mr. Mosgorovsky, he has the key.'
'Well,' said Bundle, 'there are other keys.'
She perceived that the lock was a perfectly ordinary one which probably could be easily unlocked by the key of one of the other doors. Alfred, rather troubled, was sent to collect likely specimens. The fourth that Bundle tried fitted. She turned it, opened the door and passed through.
She found herself in a small, dingy apartment. A long table occupied the centre of the room with chairs ranged round it. There was no other furniture in the room. Two built-in cupboards stood on either side of the fireplace. Alfred indicated the nearer one with a nod.
'That's it,' he explained.
Bundle tried the cupboard door, but it was locked, and she saw at once that this lock was a very different affair. It was of the patent kind that would only yield to its own key.
''Ighly ingenious, it is,' explained Alfred. 'It looks all right when opened. Shelves, you know, with a few ledgers and that on 'em. Nobody'd ever suspect, but you touch the right spot and the whole thing swings open.'
Bundle had turned round and was surveying the room thoughtfully. The first thing she noticed was that the door by which they had entered was carefully fitted round with baize. It must be completely soundproof. Then her eyes wandered to the chairs. There were seven of them, three each side and one rather more imposing in design at the head of the table.
Bundle's eyes brightened. She had found what she was looking for. This, she felt sure, was the meeting place of the secret organisation. The place was almost perfectly planned. It looked so innocent – you could reach it just by stepping through the gaming room, or you could arrive there by the secret entrance – and any secrecy, any precautions were easily explained by the gaming going on in the next room.
Idly, as these thoughts passed through her mind, she drew a finger across the marble of the mantelpiece. Alfred saw and misinterpreted the action.
'You won't find no dirt, not to speak of,' he said. 'Mr. Mosgorovsky, he ordered the place to be swept out this morning, and I did it while he waited.'
'Oh!' said Bundle, thinking very hard. 'This morning, eh?'
'Has to be done sometimes,' said Alfred. 'Though the room's never what you might call used.'
Next minute he received a shock.
'Alfred,' said Bundle, 'you've got to find me a place in this room where I can hide.'
Alfred looked at her in dismay.
'But it's impossible, my lady. You'll get me into trouble and I'll lose my job.'
'You'll lose it anyway when you go to prison,' said Bundle unkindly. 'But as a matter of fact, you needn't worry, nobody will know anything about it.'
'And there ain't no place,' wailed Alfred. 'Look round for yourself, your ladyship, if you don't believe me.'
Bundle was forced to admit that there was something in this argument. But she had the true spirit of one undertaking adventures.
'Nonsense,' she said with determination. 'There has got to be a place.'
'But there ain't one,' wailed Alfred.
Never had a room shown itself more unpropitious for concealment. Dingy blinds were drawn down over the dirty window panes, and there were no curtains. The windowsill outside, which Bundle examined, was about four inches wide! Inside the room there were the table, the chairs and the cupboards.
The second cupboard had a key in the lock. Bundle went across and pulled it open. Inside were shelves covered with an odd assortment of glasses and crockery.
'Surplus stuff as we don't use,' explained Alfred. 'You can see for yourself, my lady, there's no place here as a cat could hide.'
But Bundle was examining the shelves.
'Flimsy work,' she said. 'Now then, Alfred, have you got a cupboard downstairs where you could shove all this glass? You have! Good. Then get a tray and start to carry it down at once. Hurry – there's no time to lose.'
'You can't, my lady. And it's getting late, too. The cooks will be here any minute now.'
'Mr. Mosgo-whatnot doesn't come till later, I suppose?'
'He's never here much before midnight. But oh, my lady –'
'Don't talk so much, Alfred,' said Bundle. 'Get that tray. If you stay here arguing, you will get into
