The footstep receded, slow, measured, heavy. Coming to the conclusion that it was a policeman in the Avenue, I raised my head. I had no sense of queerness in my situation. It seemed as much a matter of course as if I had been doing the same sort of thing ever since I was born. There was apparently a providence in all this, for, looking up, I spied a window I had not seen before, because it was hidden by the shrub. This, if any, would have been neglected by the servants when they went to bed. With scarcely the stirring of a leaf I got on my feet again—and, lo! the miracle. The window was actually open. I had nothing to do but push it a few inches higher, drag myself up and wriggle in. I accomplished this without a sound that could be detected twenty feet away. Coming down on my hands and knees, I found myself amid the odor of eatables, chiefly that of fruit. I rested a minute to get my bearings, which I did by the sense of smell. I knew I must be in a sort of pantry. By putting out my hands carefully, so as to knock nothing over, I perceived that it was little more than a closet with shelves. A thrill of excitement passed through me from head to foot when my hand rested on an apple. I ate the apple there and then, kneeling upright, my toes bent under me. I ate another and another. Feeling cautiously, I discovered a tin box in which there were bread and cake. I ate of both. Getting softly on my feet, I groped for other things, which proved in the main to be no more than tea, coffee, spices, and starch. Then my fingers ran over a strawlike surface, and I knew I had hold of a demijohn. Smell told me that it contained sherry, and such knowledge of housekeeping as I possessed suggested that it was cooking-sherry. I took a long swig of it. Two long swigs were enough. It burnt me, and yet it braced me. With the food I had eaten I felt literally like a giant refreshed with wine. It occurred to me that this was a point at which I might draw back. But the spell of the unknown was upon me, and I determined to go at least a little farther. Very, very stealthily I opened the door. I was not in a kitchen, as I expected to find myself, but in a servants’ dining-room. I got the dim outlines of chairs and what I took to be a dresser or a bookcase. Another open door led into a hall.