He paused now, his lips
set hard, crouched by the fence that separated the Mole's backyard from
the alleyway. His plan was simple; but it depended for its ultimate
success almost entirely on his ability to secure an instant means of
disappearance for the Tocsin the moment she was outside the Mole's
walls. That he could find her, that he could get her out of the house
was another matter--he could only trust to his wits and nerve in that
respect. But if he succeeded in that, then--he moved silently a little
further up the lane, crossed to the other side and halted again, this
time before the back door of a shed. In an instant his picklock was at
work; in another he had opened the door a bare fraction of an inch. His
lips grew tighter, as he retraced his steps to the Mole's fence. If that
shed were ever needed at all, there would not be time to fumble in the
dark for knob or latch--and there would be no necessity for that
fumbling now! From the shed there was a very sure means of escape across
a small intervening yard, and out through an areaway into the street,
for the shed was one of the many entrances to Foo Sen's, a place with
which he was very intimately acquainted--all this, of course, provided
that, if the Tocsin were seen to enter the shed, _some one_ held the
pursuers back long enough to afford her time to reach the street.
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