When they came to the gate leading into Friday Lane, Harry wasn't there. Pushing the machine behind a hedge, they went in search of him. They called his name and paused to listen. He had tricked them before, trying to make them believe that they wouldn't find him, then startling them into laughter by playing his mouth-organ in a tree right above their heads. They persuaded themselves that that was what was happening now. Every few steps they would stop and look up into the boughs, shouting, “We've found you. We know where you're hiding. You may as well come down.” If he heard them, he refused to fall into their trap. They came to the Haunted Wood and entered. In its dark green shadows, where all things trod softly, they dared not shout. They whispered their assertion that they had guessed his whereabouts. Only the little river answered, now mocking them secretly, now babbling hoarsely, alarmed that it would never get out. They began to tiptoe. Fear of the silence seized them. A branch cracked; they only just saved themselves from running. It seemed as though a magician had waved his wand, casting a spell; everything slept. Everything except the river--and at last, because its voice was solitary, it became terrible, like that of a dying man in a shuttered room, who muttered deliriously and tossed upon his bed. The green stretch of grass, with the cowslips scattered over it, brought relief to their suspense. But, here again, there was no welcome. Bees hummed above the flowers, quite indifferent to their presence. The bee-hive cottage stood with door and windows wide, as though its inhabitants had been called away suddenly and would never return. Beneath the smiling of the summer stillness lay the threat that something evil had happened. Even Canute had vanished. They stole round the house and at last crossed the threshold. Everything was as they remembered it, even to the mandolin lying across the chair. They listened. Voices! Yes, certainly. Then laughter, clear and pleasant; it broke off in the middle, as if someone paused for breath. It came from the Faun Man's room overhead, which Harry had never invited them to enter. Hand-in-hand they' climbed the stairs--steep and narrow stairs, which ended abruptly in a white door. They tapped. A man answered. Peter raised the latch.