“Yes, sir,” replied Patsy’s voice. Mr Fanshawe passed into the dining-room for a whisky and soda. He consumed three on the principle of the camel who has to face the desert. At half-past eleven he went to his room. At twelve, with two or three exceptions, the household was snoring. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ CHAPTER XXXVII FLIGHT He heard the clock strike twelve. There were two mortal hours yet to be consumed in idleness. He could do nothing, and the whole of his future happiness was in the hands of Patsy and Larry Lyburn. He sought for and found a rank old briar root—true friend in the past on many a moor, at many a covert side, filled it with cut cavendish, and lit it. He was only taking a hunting kit-bag. It was already packed, but he unpacked it, and packed it again to kill time. In the midst of these occupations the clock struck one. There was something sinister in the extreme silence of the house. One could not but fancy subterfuge in it; and under its cloak armed surprise. Mr Fanshawe, seated on his bed, smoking and staring at the hunting kit-bag now stuffed, locked and strapped, heard in imagination the banging of doors, the screaming of maid-servants, and the raucous voice of his uncle crying, “Stop them!” Then he began to find fault with himself for not ordering a special train. A wire had come that afternoon from the General Manager of the Great Midland of Ireland, saying that the express from Carlow would stop at Tullagh as directed, but, all the same, a special would have been safer, for, should anything happen to delay him on the drive to Tullagh the express would not wait. It is in this way that men discover holes in their armour at the last moment, just before the fight, a faulty string in their banjo when they are on the platform, and the audience is preparing to wreathe itself in smiles at the comic song. Mr Fanshawe went to the window and peeped out. The moon, just after the full, was swinging in a cloudless sky, the park lay under the moon covered with a thin winter mist. The great funereal masses of the woods, the distant hills like a troop of gigantic horsemen cloaked, and riding under the night, made a picture after the heart of Gustave Doré. Mr Fanshawe looked at his watch. It was ten minutes to two. He took the hunting kit-bag in one hand and the solitary candle in the other and left the room. The house was solidly constructed, and the stair carpets were thick, so he could move without making the least sound. As he came down the last steps to the hall the place looked vast, and the men in armour interested and not too surely amiable spectators of the scene. A small figure stood at the foot of the stairs. It was Patsy. “Is all right, Patsy?” whispered Mr Fanshawe.