Nor did my sense leave me.  In a minute I was up on my feet again.  I listened.  All was still silent.  I cast a glance upwards.  The window from which I had descended was still dark.  I could see the broken bell-ropes dangling from the shutter, and I noted, with a glow of professional pride, that my expert join between the two ropes had not given.  The lower rope had parted in the middle ....

I crammed Semlin’s hat on my head, retrieved his bag and overcoat from the corner of the court where they had fallen and the next moment was tiptoeing down the ladder.

The iron stair ran down beside the window in which I had seen the light burning.  The lower part of the window was screened off by a dirty muslin curtain.  Through the upper part I caught a glimpse of a sort of scullery with a paraffin lamp standing on a wooden table.  The room was empty.  From top to bottom the window was protected by heavy iron bars.

At the foot of the iron stair stood, as I had anticipated, a door.  It was my last chance of escape.  It stood a dozen yards from the bottom of the ladder across a dank, little paved area where tins of refuse were standing—­a small door with a brass handle.

I ducked low as I clambered down the iron ladder so as not to be seen from the window should anyone enter the scullery as I passed.  Treading very softly I crept across the little area and, as quietly as I could, turned the handle of the door.

It turned round easily in my hand, but nothing happened.

The door was locked.

CHAPTER VI

I BOARD THE BERLIN TRAIN AND LEAVE A LAME GENTLEMAN ON THE PLATFORM

I was caught like a rat in a trap.  I could not return by the way I had come and the only egress was closed to me.  The area door and window were the only means of escape from the little court.  The one was locked, the other barred.  I was fairly trapped.  All I had to do now was to wait until my absence was discovered and the broken rope found to show them where I was.  Then they would come down to the area, I should be confronted with the man, Stelze, and my goose would be fairly cooked.

As quietly as I could I made a complete, thorough, rapid examination of the area.  It was a dank, dark place, only lit where the yellow light streamed forth from the scullery.  It had a couple of low bays hollowed out of the masonry under the little courtyard, the one filled with wood blocks, the other with broken packingcases, old bottles and like rubbish.  I explored these until my hands came in contact with the damp bricks at the back, but in vain.  Door and window remained the only means of escape.

Four tall tin refuse tins stood in line in front of these two bays, a fifth was stowed away under the iron stair.  They were all nearly full of refuse, so were useless as hiding places.  In any case it accorded neither with the part I was playing nor with my sense of the ludicrous to be discovered by the hotel domestics hiding in a refuse bin.