The gate led into an ornamental garden with the Castle at the further end. All the windows were in darkness. We threaded a garden path leading to the house. It brought us in front of a glass door. I turned the handle and it yielded to my grasp. I whispered to Francis: "Stay where you are! And if you hear me shout, fly for your life!" For, I reflected, the place might be full of troops. If there were any risk it would be better for me to take it since Francis, with his identity papers, had a better chance than I of bringing the document into safety. I opened the glass door and found myself in a lobby with a door on the right. I listened again. All was still. I cautiously opened the door and looked in. As I did so the place was suddenly flooded with light and a voice--a voice I had often heard in my dreams--called out imperiously: "Stay where you are and put your hands above your head!" Clubfoot stood there, a pistol in his great hand pointed at me. "Grundt!" I shouted but I did not move. And Clubfoot laughed. CHAPTER XVII FRANCIS TAKES UP THE NARRATIVE I saw the lights flash up in the room. I heard Desmond cry out: "Grundt;" Instantly I flung myself flat on my face in the flower bed, lest Desmond's shout might have alarmed the soldiers about the fire. But no one came; the gardens remained dark and damp and silent, and I heard no sound from the room in which I knew my brother to be in the clutches of that man. Desmond's cry pulled me together. It seemed to arouse me from the lethargy into which I had sunk during all those months of danger and disappointment. It shook me into life. If I was to save him, not a moment was to be lost. Clubfoot would act swiftly, I knew. So must I. But first I must find out what the situation was, the meaning of Clubfoot's presence in Monica's house, of those soldiers in the park. And, above all, was Monica herself at the Castle? I had noticed a little estaminet place on the road, about a hundred yards before we reached the Schloss. I might, at least, be able to pick up something there. Accordingly, I stole across the garden, scaled the wall again and reached the road in safety. The estaminet was full of people, brutish-looking peasants swilling neat spirits, cattle drovers and the like. I stood up at the bar and ordered a double noggin of _Korn_--a raw spirit made in these parts from potatoes, very potent but at least pure. A man in corduroys and leggings was drinking at the bar, a bluff sort of chap, who readily entered into conversation. A casual question of mine about the game conditions elicited from him the information that he was an under-keeper at the Castle. It was a busy time for them, he told me, as four big shoots had been arranged. The first was to take place the next day. There were plenty of birds, and he thought the Frau Gräfin's guests ought to be satisfied.