Why, in the sacred name of common-sense, should he have been imprisoned in the state suite?  The only answer to the conundrum was that nobody was aware of his quite unauthorised presence in the state suite.  But then why should the state suite be so suddenly locked up, since the Countess had just come in from a drive?  It then occurred to him that, instead of just coming in, the Countess had been just leaving.  The carriage must have driven round from some humbler part of the Hall, with the lady in black in it, and the lady in black—­perhaps a lady’s-maid—­alone had stepped out from it.  The Countess had been waiting for the carriage in the porch, and had fled to avoid being forced to meet the unfortunate Denry. (Humiliating thought!) The carriage had then taken her up at a side door.  And now she was gone.  Possibly she had left Sneyd Hall not to return for months, and that was why the doors had been locked.  Perhaps everybody had departed from the Hall save one aged and deaf retainer—­he knew, from historical novels which he had glanced at in his youth, that in every Hall that respected itself an aged and deaf retainer was invariably left solitary during the absences of the noble owner.  He knocked on the small disguised door.  His unique purpose in knocking was naturally to make a noise, but something prevented him from making a noise.  He felt that he must knock decently, discreetly; he felt that he must not outrage the conventions.

No result to this polite summoning.

He attacked other doors; he attacked every door he could put his hands on; and gradually he lost his respect for decency and the conventions proper to Halls, knocking loudly and more loudly.  He banged.  Nothing but sheer solidity stopped his sturdy hands from going through the panels.  He so far forgot himself as to shake the doors with all his strength furiously.

And finally he shouted:  “Hi there!  Hi!  Can’t you hear?”

Apparently the aged and deaf retainer could not hear.  Apparently he was the deafest retainer that a peeress of the realm ever left in charge of a princely pile.

“Well, that’s a nice thing!” Denry exclaimed, and he noticed that he was hot and angry.  He took a certain pleasure in being angry.  He considered that he had a right to be angry.

At this point he began to work himself up into the state of “not caring,” into the state of despising Sneyd Hall, and everything for which it stood.  As for permitting himself to be impressed or intimidated by the lonely magnificence of his environment, he laughed at the idea; or, more accurately, he snorted at it.  Scornfully he tramped up and down those immense interiors, doing the caged lion, and cogitating in quest of the right dramatic, effective act to perform in the singular crisis.  Unhappily, the carpets were very thick, so that though he could tramp, he could not stamp; and he desired to stamp.  But in the connecting doorways there were expanses of bare, highly-polished oak floor, and here he did stamp.