Here I remained until it was very nearly as dark as pitch; and the house being full of footpads and cutthroats, I thought it right to leave them.  One or two came after me, in the hope of designing a stratagem; but I dropped them in the darkness; and knowing all the neighbourhood well, I took up my position, two hours before midnight, among the shrubs at the eastern end of Lord Brandir’s mansion.  Hence, although I might not see, I could scarcely fail to hear, if any unlawful entrance either at back or front were made.

From my own observation, I thought it likely that the attack would be in the rear; and so indeed it came to pass.  For when all the lights were quenched, and all the house was quiet, I heard a low and wily whistle from a clump of trees close by; and then three figures passed between me and a whitewashed wall, and came to a window which opened into a part of the servants’ basement.  This window was carefully raised by some one inside the house; and after a little whispering, and something which sounded like a kiss, all the three men entered.

“Oh, you villains!” I said to myself, “this is worse than any Doone job; because there is treachery in it.”  But without waiting to consider the subject from a moral point of view, I crept along the wall, and entered very quietly after them; being rather uneasy about my life, because I bore no fire-arms, and had nothing more than my holly staff, for even a violent combat.

To me this was matter of deep regret, as I followed these vile men inward.  Nevertheless I was resolved that my Lorna should not be robbed again.  Through us (or at least through our Annie) she had lost that brilliant necklace; which then was her only birthright:  therefore it behoved me doubly, to preserve the pewter box; which must belong to her in the end, unless the thieves got hold of it.

I went along very delicately (as a man who has learned to wrestle can do, although he may weigh twenty stone), following carefully the light, brought by the traitorous maid, and shaking in her loose dishonest hand.  I saw her lead the men into a little place called a pantry; and there she gave them cordials, and I could hear them boasting.

Not to be too long over it—­which they were much inclined to be—­I followed them from this drinking-bout, by the aid of the light they bore, as far as Earl Brandir’s bedroom, which I knew, because Lorna had shown it to me that I might admire the tapestry.  But I had said that no horse could ever be shod as the horses were shod therein, unless he had the foot of a frog, as well as a frog to his foot.  And Lorna had been vexed at this (as taste and high art always are, at any small accurate knowledge), and so she had brought me out again, before I had time to admire things.