It seemed curious to him that he had so carefully replaced everything after making his discovery, and that without any forethought or special intention he had put back everything so exactly as he had found it when the slightest neglect or failure in that respect would most certainly have cost him his life.

And he felt that as yet he could not afford to die.

One by one he drove in the nails, and as he worked at his gruesome task he heard the faintest rustle on the landing without—­the faintest sound of a soft breath cautiously drawn in, of a light foot very carefully set down.

Deede Dawson plainly heard nothing; indeed, no ear less acute and less well-trained than Dunn’s could have caught sounds that were so slight and low, but he, listening between each stroke of his hammer, was sure that it was Ella who had followed them, and that she crouched upon the landing without, watching and listening.

Did that mean, he wondered, that she, too, knew?  Or was it merely natural curiosity; hostile in part, perhaps, since evidently the relations between her and her stepfather were not too friendly—­a desire to know what task there could be in the attics so late at night for which Deede Dawson had such need of his captive’s help?

Or was it by any chance because she wished to know how things went with him, and what was to be his fate?

In any case, Dunn was sure that Ella had followed then, and was on the landing without.

He drove home the last nail and stood up.  “That’s done,” he said.

“And well done,” said Deede Dawson.  “Well done—­Charley Wright.”

He spoke the name softly and lingeringly, and then all at once he began to laugh, a low and somewhat dreadful laughter that had in it no mirth at all, and that sounded horrible and strange in the chill emptiness of the attic.

Leaning one hand on the packing-case that served as the coffin of his dead friend, Dunn swore a silent oath to exact full retribution, and henceforth to put that purpose on a level with the mission on which originally he had come.

Aloud, and in a grumbling tone he said: 

“What’s the matter with my name?  It’s a name like any other.  What’s wrong with it?”

“What should there be?” flashed Deede Dawson in reply.

“I don’t know,” Dunn answered.  “You keep repeating it so, that’s all.”

“It’s a very good name,” Deede Dawson said.  “An excellent name.  But it’s not suitable.  Not here.”  He began to laugh again and then stopped abruptly.

“Do you know, I think you had better choose another?” he said.

“It’s all one to me,” declared Dunn.  “If Charley Wright don’t suit, how will Robert Dunn do?  I knew a man of that name once.”

“It’s a better name than Charley Wright,” said Deede Dawson.  “We’ll call you Robert Dunn—­Charley Wright.  Do you know why I can’t have you call yourself Charley Wight?”