The shed was empty. Folk were passing to and fro in front of it; the
North Sea tug still lay at the wharf beyond; a man who was evidently its
skipper sat on a tub on its deck placidly smoking his short pipe--but of
Addie Chatfield or of Andrius there was no sign. And the silence in that
crumbling, rat-haunted house was deeper than ever.
"Guv'nor!" muttered Spurge, "How long is it since you see--her?"
"Almost as soon as you'd gone," answered Copplestone.
"Ten minutes ago!" sighed Spurge. "Guv'nor--they've done us! They're off!
I see it--she must ha' caught sight o' me, nosing round, and she came
here and gave the others the office, and they bucked out at the back.
The back, Guv'nor! and Lord bless you, at the back o' this shanty there's
a perfect rabbit-warren o' places--more by token, they call it the
Warren. If they've got in there, why, all the police in Norcaster'll
never find 'em--leastways, I mean, to speak truthful, not without a deal
o' trouble."
"What about upstairs?" asked Copplestone.
"Upstairs, now?" said Spurge with a doubtful glance at the ramshackle
stairway. "Lord, mister!--I don't believe nobody could get up them
stairs! No--they've hooked it through the back here, into the Warren. And
once in there--"
He ended with an eloquent gesture, and dismounting from his perch made
his way along the passage to a door which opened into the shed.
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