It was a full day’s work, from daybreak to long past sunset, to erect the shed from materials carefully prepared beforehand. Dick felt the necessity of completing the apparatus before another day dawned, lest their proceedings should be spied from a passing boat and reported in the village before they were ready. He obtained permission from his father to remain out, telling him frankly what his purpose was, but without giving details, and toiled on, by the light of a screened lantern, until the whole contrivance wis finished. The booby-trap consisted of a pail nicely balanced on a bar running across the shed, and filled with water deeply coloured with indigo. It was connected by a thread with a loose board in the floor beneath, so that a trespasser stepping across the threshold would snap the thread, cause the pail to turn on its axis, and receive its contents on his head. "The parson used flour, he told me," said Dick, "but ’tis too good to waste on those rascals." "Ay, and a dousin’ will make ’em cuss more," said Sam. "Oh, ’twill grieve me tarrible if I be asleep!" Three days passed. Apparently the shed had not been discovered by the villagers. The boys tested their invention and found it successful. They took the boat out each morning, and restored it to its place when the day’s fishing was done, fastening the door from the inside, connecting it with the booby-trap, and leaving the shed by a small door, just large enough to crawl through, at the back. On the third evening Mr. Carlyon came to the Towers to join the Trevanions in a game of whist, as he did frequently during the winter months. It was a still, clear night, with a touch of frost in the air; but the cold did not penetrate to the Squire’s room, where a blazing wood fire threw a rosy radiance on the panelled walls, and woke smiling reflections in the glasses and decanters that stood on a table near that at which the party of four were absorbed in their game. The house was quiet; Reuben and Sam had retired to rest, for the Vicar would need no attendance when he mounted his cob to ride home. The Squire was in the act of shuffling the pack, when suddenly the silence of the house was shattered by a tremendous crash in one of the rooms above. Mrs. Trevanion pressed her hand to her side; the Squire missed his cast, and let the cards fall to the floor; Mr. Carlyon put down the glass which he had just raised to his lips, so hastily that the fluid spilled on the baize. Dick sprang up. "’Tis the alarm!" he cried. "They are at my shed!" He dashed out of the room, to meet Sam in shirt and breeches tumbling down the stairs. Dick seized a cutlass hanging on the wall, Sam the parson’s riding-whip, and throwing open the door they sallied out into the night. "It dinged me out of a lovely dream," said Sam. "Dash my buttons, ’twas a noble noise." They scampered along the cliff to the zigzag path. Meanwhile the Squire hurriedly explained the matter to the astonished Vicar.