He followed her out of the cellar up a short, narrow flight of rickety stairs. At the end of the passage was a door, the lock of which was broken. This door opened upon half a dozen stone steps, and at one time had probably been used as a kitchen entrance for tradesmen. A little rusty gate at the top opened into the Square. Only two of the houses had an entrance of a similar description, and Dick inwardly railed at his own lack of foresight in overlooking this means of getting into Samuel Boyd's residence. Upon further reflection, however, he thought it hardly likely that he would have succeeded in carrying his investigations to the point which Gracie's shrewdness and pertinacity had enabled her to reach. "It's a good job for me the place is empty," said Gracie. "I had to get into Mr. Boyd's house somehow, you know, even if I had to climb the wall at the back, the way the murderer and the newspaper man did. As I was looking at the houses I saw these steps, and when nobody was in the Square I crept down. It was all a job to push the door open, but I did, and there I was, without anybody seeing me. Then I tried to get into the backyard, but couldn't. I knew there was only a wall between me and the next house, and I thought of the way prisoners make their escape from prison. They made holes in walls--why couldn't I? I found a bit of old iron in the cellar here, and I poked at the bricks with it till I came across one that was looser than the others. It didn't take me long to push it through, and when I got that out the rest was easy. That's the way of it, Dick." "You were in the dark all the time." "That didn't matter. I've got cat's eyes." "You're a clever girl." "Thank you, Dick. When you say anything like that to me I feel warm all over." "What made you so anxious to get into Mr. Boyd's house? Surely you did not expect to find your father there?" "I don't know what I didn't expect. I thought I might find a bit of paper with his writing on it that'd tell me where to look for him. I told you about my dream the night before last, and how I promised father I'd catch the murderer. I dreamt of him again last night. 'Don't forget your promise,' he said. 'Look for me in Catchpole Square.' 'You ain't dead, are you, father?' I asked. 'No,' he said, 'look for me in Catchpole Square, and catch the murderer.' It's a large order, ain't it, Dick?" There was nothing humorous in the question; her voice was perfectly passionless, but Dick had a clear sense of the absorbing earnestness and the pitiful pathos which lay beneath, unexpressed though they were in tone or gesture. "Poor little Gracie!" he said. "The body of a mouse and the heart of a lion." "I _am_ small, ain't I? But I shall grow. Did I do right, Dick, in coming to tell you about the hole? Don't say you're mad with me." "I won't. You did quite right, and I only wish you were a man. You and I together would get at the bottom of a mystery that is making many innocent people unhappy."