The ground before them had been a sunken garden, from which a steep wall, once covered with creepers and rock plants, rose to a long verandah, which was pillared and open on that side; but at each end built up half-way and glazed for the rest. There was a glass roof, and inside untended shrubs sprawled in broken plaster vases.
"Ye must bide here," said Dougal, "and no cheep above your breath. Afore we dare to try that wall, I must ken where Lean and Spittal and Dobson are. I'm off to spy the policies." He glided out of sight behind a clump of pampas grass.
For hours, so it seemed, Dickson was left to his own unpleasant reflections. His body, prone on the moist earth, was fairly comfortable, but his mind was ill at ease. The scramble up the hillside had convinced him that he was growing o
