“I don’t see how it could be,” said Dick. “Come on — let’s get down. At least it’s a way in.” He shone his torch into the hole. “Yes, look — there’s a whole lot of coke down there — we can easily jump on to it. Tim, you go first and spy out the land.”

Timmy jumped down at once, the coke slithering away from beneath his four paws. “He’s down all right,” said Julian. “I’ll go next.”

Down he jumped, and the coke slithered away again, making what seemed to be a very loud noise indeed in the silent night. Julian shone his torch around.

They were standing on a very large heap of coke in the middle of a big cellar. At the end was a door.

“Hope it’s not locked,” said Dick, in a whisper. “Now, Tim, keep to heel, for goodness sake, and don’t make a sound!”

They went to the door, treading on gritty bits of coke, Julian turned the dirty handle — and the door opened inwards! “It’s not locked!” said Julian, thankfully.

They crept through it, Timmy treading on their heels, and found themselves in another cellar, set with stone shelves on which were piled tins and boxes and crates. “Enough food here to stand a siege!” whispered Dick. “Where are the cellar-steps? We’ve got to get out of here.”

“Over there,” said Julian. Then he stopped and put out his torch. He had heard something.

“Did you hear that?” he whispered. “It sounded like somebody treading on the coke in the coal-cellar! Gosh, I hope nobody is shadowing us. We’ll soon be prisoners if so.”

They listened but heard nothing further. Up the stone steps they went and undid the door at the top. A big kitchen lay beyond, lighted by the dim moon. A shadow rose suddenly in front of them and Timmy growled. Dick’s heart almost stopped beating. What in the world was that, crawling silently over the floor and disappearing in the shadows? He clutched at Julian and made him jump.

“Don’t do that, ass! That was only the kitchen cat you saw,” whispered Julian. “Gosh, you made me jump. Wasn’t it a good thing that Timmy didn’t go for the cat? There would have been an awful yowling!”

“Where do you suppose George will be?” asked Dick. “Somewhere at the top of the house?”

“I’ve no idea. We’ll just have to look into every room,” said Julian. So they looked into every room on the ground floor, but they were empty. They were huge rooms, ugly and over-furnished.

“Come on — up the stairs!” said Dick, and up they went. They came to an enormous landing, hung with tapestry curtains at the windows. Timmy suddenly gave a small growl and in a trice both boys had hidden themselves in the folds of the long window-curtains. Timmy went with them, feeling surprised. Dick peeped out after a minute.

“I think it was that cat again,” he whispered. “Look, there it is, up on that chest. It’s following us, wondering what on earth we’re doing, I expect!”