“Yes, sir,” answered the conch, shifting his course. so as to bring his steps in a roundabout way toward the squat storeroom.  “And before you begin there’s an extra key to the room under the second packing box to the right.  I made it from Roke’s own key when I made duplicates of all the keys here.  I put it there this morning.  In case you should want to get out, you can say you found it lying on the floor there.  I rusted all the keys I made so they look old.  He’ll likely think it’s an extra key that was lost somewhere in there.”

“Thanks,” said Gavin.  “You’re a good boy.  And you’ve got sense.  Now listen:—­”

Talking swiftly and earnestly. he followed Davy toward the square little iron building, the conch outwardly making no sign that he heard.  For, not many yards away, a handful of conchs and negroes were at work on a half-completed shed.

Davy came to the store-room door, and opened it.  Then. turning to Brice he said aloud in the wretched dialect of his class: 

“Funny avocado fruits all pile up in yon.  Mighty funny.  Make yo’ laugh.  Want to go see?  Look!”

He swung wide the iron door and pointed to the almost totally dark interior.

“Funny to see in yon,” he said invitingly.  “Never see any like ’em befo’.  I strike light for you.  Arter you, my boss.”

One or two men working on the nearby shed had stopped their labor and were glancing covertly toward them.

“Oh, all right!” agreed Brice. his uninterested voice carrying well though it was not noticeably raised.  “It seems a stuffy sort of hole.  But I’ll take a look at it if you like.  Where’s that light you’re going to strike?  It—­”

As he spoke he sauntered into the storeroom.  His lazy speech was cut short by the clangorous slamming of the iron door behind him.  Conscientiously he pounded on the iron and yelled wrathful commands to Davy to open.  Then when he thought he had made noise enough to add verity to his role and to free the conch from any onlooker’s suspicion he desisted.

Groping his way through the dimness to the nearest box. he sat down, philosophically, to wait.

“Well,” he mused sniffing in no approval at all at the musty air of the place and peering up at the single eight-inch barred window that served more for ventilation than for light.  “Well, here we are.  And here, presumably, we stay till Standish and Hade go back to the mainland.  Then I’m to be let out by Roke, with many apologies for Davy’s mistake.  There’ll be no way of getting back.  The boats will be hidden or padlocked.  And here I’ll stay, with Roke for a chum. till whatever is going on at Standish’s house is safely finished with.  It’s a pretty program.  If I can get away to-night without Roke’s finding it out till morning—­”

His eyes were beginning to accustom themselves to the room.  Its corners and farther reaches and most of its floor were still invisible.  But, by straining his gaze, he could just make out the shapes of a crate or two and several packing boxes close to the wall.  The central space was clear.  In spite of the stuffiness. there was a damp chill to the gloomy place, by contrast to the vivid sunlight and the sweep of the trade-winds. outside.