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Page 71
It was insecure enough, anyway, but they felt it ought to be left in
readiness for a flight that might have no second to waste. Now, with
eyes sharply challenging the shadows, they stole along the edge of
the palace.
Staring up at the building, Billy stopped. "Here's a place a story
and a half high--you could almost climb up by those carvings without
any ladder. And there's the next higher roof back of it--and then
you must go there to the left."
"I can make it," said Falconer, surely. "Now how much time shall I
allow you for your sawing--fifteen minutes?"
"Guess you'd better," Billy reflected, and they compared watches.
It was tremendously difficult to arrive at any sort of concerted
action on this bewildering expedition, but they were hoping to
achieve it. Their plan had the simplicity of all desperate measures.
One from below and one from above they were to make their way to
that rose room and fight the way out with the girl. They considered
it wiser to come from two directions, for if one were discovered and
the alarm raised, the other had still a chance of getting off with
Arlee, and if one were trying to escape, the other could cover his
flight. They had drawn straws for their positions, and Billy had
been slightly relieved that the entrance from below, which he
considered a trifle more difficult, had fallen to him. He felt
responsible, as well as he might, for Falconer's neck.
Now he steadied one narrow ladder of poles while Falconer crept up
it and then drew it up after him; and after a few moments of
waiting, crouched in the shadow, Billy saw the Englishman's figure
reappear against the sky on top of a higher roof. The route over
the old buildings had been found, so Billy turned and crept forward
along the wall, carrying the last long ladder of poles in his hand.
It was an unwieldy thing to carry and it distracted his attention
harassingly.
"My job," said he to himself, "is evidently to make a racket and
draw their fire from below while that red-headed chap carries Arlee
off from above. Well, I hope to the Lord he does. When I think of
her here----"
But it was unnerving to think of her here, so he didn't. He kept his
mind steadily on the plan. He had reached the stone steps that led
from the garden to the harem now, and laying down his pole-like
ladder he slipped up them and turned the handle.
But the door was locked. Fearful lest the grating of the knob should
have roused some watcher, he ran down the steps and hurried into the
shadow of the banquet hall, where he stood close beside a pillar
until he satisfied himself of the objects in the court beyond. He
saw an edge of light along the crack of a closed door to the left on
the ground floor of the _selamlik_, and in the higher stories above
that a couple of windows showed a pale illumination. On the right,
in the harem, only one window betrayed a ray of light. Altogether
the old pile was as gloomy and gruesome as a tomb.
Billy stared across the court to where the columned vestibule,
uniting the two Ls, indicated the door. He had been told a watchman
slept there, but he could see nothing now but vague outlines of the
arches of the vestibule. To the left was the open passage left for
the entry of the automobile and horses, but this, too, was roofed so
that a black shadow lay over it. But for that watchman Billy would
have made his way to those doors to draw back the bars in readiness,
but fearful of raising an alarm, he judged it was better to leave
escape to chance and turn his attention to his entry.
He went back now for his ladder, and on the right side of the
banquet hall, up under the arched roof, he discovered the wooden
grating where Fritzi had described it. Against this wall he placed
his ladder and climbed to the top, from which he could reach up and
clasp the spindles of the grating above him.
He drew himself swiftly up to this, and the end of his pole was
dislodged by his departure and fell to the inlaid pavement with a
bang that seemed to him to carry to the farthest echoes of the
sounding court. Instantly there was an answering clatter of steps.
Like a monkey Billy clung to the grating, thrusting his toes
desperately into the first openings they could find, hanging on with
his hands for dear life, holding himself as close up in the darkness
as he could, and nearly twisting his neck off in the effort to watch
what was going on below him.
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