The "it" into which she desired him to snap was apparently a small door that led to the club's service quarters. It was the one strategic point not yet guarded by a stocky figure with large feet and an eye like a gimlet. To it his companion went like a homing rabbit, dragging him with her. They passed through; and John, with a resourcefulness of which he was surprised to find himself capable, turned the key in the lock. "Smooth!" said Miss Molloy approvingly. "Nice work! That'll hold them for a while." It did. From the other side of the door there proceeded a confused shouting, and somebody twisted the handle with a good deal of petulance, but the Law had apparently forgotten to bring its axe with it to-night, and nothing further occurred. They made their way down a stuffy passage, came presently to a second door, and, passing through this, found themselves in a backyard, fragrant with the scent of old cabbage stalks and dish water. Miss Molloy listened. John listened. They could hear nothing but a distant squealing and tooting of horns, which, though it sounded like something out of the repertoire of the Collegiate Buddies, was in reality the noise of the traffic in Regent Street. "All quiet along the Potomac," said Miss Molloy with satisfaction. "Now," she added briskly, "if you'll just fetch one of those ash cans and put it alongside that wall and give me a leg-up and help me round that chimney and across that roof and down into the next yard and over another wall or two, I think everything will be more or less jake." V John sat in the lobby of the Lincoln Hotel in Curzon Street. A lifetime of activity and dizzy hustle had passed, but it had all been crammed into just under twenty minutes, and, after seeing his fair companion off in a taxicab, he had made his way to the Lincoln, to ascertain from a sleepy night porter that Miss Wyvern had not yet returned. He was now awaiting her coming. She came some little while later, escorted by Hugo. It was a fair summer night, warm and still, but with her arrival a keen east wind seemed to pervade the lobby. Pat was looking pale and proud, and Hugo's usually effervescent demeanour had become toned down to a sort of mellow sadness. He had the appearance of a man who has recently been properly ticked off by a woman for Taking Me to Places Like That. "Oh, hullo, John," he murmured in a low, bedside voice. He brightened a little, as a man will who, after a bad quarter of an hour with an emotional girl, sees somebody who may possibly furnish an alternative target for her wrath. "Where did you get to? Left early to avoid the rush?"