39 ° 
THE STRAND MAGAZINE . 
“ Don't be so ridiculous ! Our bicycles 
must be somewhere' — they can’t really 
have 
u What’s that ? ” When I gave a jump 
she jumped ; we caught each other by the 
hand. A noise came from above us. “ Some- 
one is moving in the room over us. Aren’t 
those footsteps ? Listen ! ” She came so 
close that I only had to whisper. “ Leila, 
there is someone in the house besides us. 
Someone’s coming down the stairs. Whatever 
you do don’t drop that lamp.” She almost 
did ; her hand was so shaky that I thought 
for an instant it had fallen. “ 1 have a horrid 
feeling that my lamp is going out. I’m not 
sure how much carbon there is in it ; and if 
you let yours fall ” 
I stopped ; I held my breath ; we both 
held our breath. We stood quite hear to 
each other, listening with every nerve in our 
bodies. 
“ Sally, there’s someone stopped just 
outside the door.” 
I knew that someone had stopped outside 
the door without her telling me. I felt like- 
screaming. 1 almost did scream when she 
went on. 
“ Someone’s taken hold of the handle.” I 
knew that also. “ Someone’s turning it.” 
As though I could not hear 1 “ Who can it 
be ? ” 
We watched that door opening inch by 
inch ; we clung to each other so tightly that 
afterwards I found that her fingers had made 
marks all over my arm and shoulder. We 
neither of us breathed. When the door had 
opened wide enough, a head came through 
the opening, and a face looked into the room 
— a horrid face. It seemed to be as much 
surprised to see us as we were to see it. As 
we stared, still without breathing, it made an 
audible remark. 
“ Strewth — if it ain’t a couple o’ gals ! ” 
In the same instant in which the words were 
uttered the face withdrew and the door w T as 
closed — we were alone again, 
“ Whoever was it ? ” whimpered Leila. 
“ It was a man.” 
“ Do you think — he’ll come back again ? 
Listen ! ” 
We did listen, and w T hile we were listening- 
something happened which made me feel 
that, the end of the w'orld must have come. 
There was a most frightful noise ; the earth 
seemed to shake ; Leila started screaming. 
I did my best not to scream with her, and I 
believe I nearly succeeded -the door was 
flung wide open ; someone demanded, in a 
coarse, uneducated, villainous voice 
cl Who made that row ? ” I will not 
repeat the exact language ; 1 am thankful tea 
think that it is still only men who use really, 
objectionable words. The voice went on 
“ Don’t look as if it came from in here.” 
“ It came from outside, that’s where it came 
from — there’s some game on.” 
The second voice came from someone in » 
the passage 
“ Game on, is there ? Perhaps they re up • 
to some little game. We’ll learn them, if they 
arc 1 Here, Joe, come in here.” 
The owner of that voice came right into 
the room, followed by the owner of the mur- 
derous-looking face. When I came to look 
at them 1 couid see that the second man was 
much worse than the first. The owner of 
the face which had peeped through the door 
was quite short, scarcely over five feet high, 
but the second man was enormous, a lot over 
six feet, with great, wide shoulders, a big 
head with an ugly, straggling beard, and 
such eyes ! And the way he spoke to us ! 
“ What are you two young gals doing in 
’ere, at this time of the night ? ” 
I tried my very hardest to give him back 
as good as he sent, and I. believe I nearly did. 
Leila confessed to me afterwards that it 
frightened her to hear me ta’king like that. 
“ That’s a question,” I said, “ which I 
should like to ask you. What are you doing- 
in here ? ” 
How that man did swear 1 He addressed 
his companion. 
“ Joe, do you hear her ? Ain’t she a nice 
young thing ? ” Then he spoke to us. 
“ Tell you what it is. Shouldn’t wonder if 
you was a pair of suffragettes.” 
From the way in which he spoke he might 
have been accusing us of being something 
lower than the beasts that grovel. How 
Leila shuddered ! Before I could think what 
to say to the creature his companion drew, as 
it seemed from my hesitation, his own 
conclusions. 
“ Edwin,” he said — his voice was both 
coarse and husky; fancy calling that great 
monster Edwin ! — “ you’ve hit it ! S’elp me, 
you have ! That’s what they are — they’re 
suffragettes.” 
“ Think so, Joe ? ” The creature eyed us 
as if he were summing us up. 
“ I’ll lay on it. You take and have a 
squint at ’em. They look that sort. I’ll ask 
them, that’s what I’ll do — I’ll ask them. 
Have you two young women come ’ere to 
set fire to this ’ouse ? Have you or haven’t 
you ? That’s what I want to know.” 
“ What business ” I replied, when I was 
