In each was evidence of Oriental occupancy; indeed, some of the
rooms possessed a sort of Arabian Nights atmosphere. But no
living creature was to be seen or heard anywhere. It was while
the two of us, having examined every inch of wall, I should
think, in the building, were standing staring rather blankly at
each other in the room with the lighted lantern, that I saw
Harley's expression change.
"Why," he muttered, "is this one room illuminated--and all the
others in darkness?"
Even then the significance of this circumstance was not apparent
to me. But Harley stared critically at an electric switch which
was placed on the immediate right of the door and then up at the
silk-shaded lantern which lighted the room. Crossing, he raised
and lowered the switch rapidly, but the lamp continued to burn
uninterruptedly!
"Ah!" he said--"a good trick!"
Grasping the wooden block to which the switch was attached, he
turned it bodily--and I saw that it was a masked knob; for in the
next moment he had pulled open the narrow section of wall--which
proved to be nothing less than a cunningly fitted door!
A small, dimly lighted apartment was revealed, the Oriental note
still predominant in its appointments, which, however, were few,
and which I scarcely paused to note.
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