The Argosy — page 285: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

204 In the Dead of Night. and experienced police officer. Many were the hours I spent in cogi- tating over one scheme after another. The result was that I could think of no safer place in which to hide an escaped prisoner than my mahogany wardrobe.” “Hide him in a wardrobe!” exclaimed Mrs. Garside, in dismay. <‘ Why, that would be one of the first places a police officer would took into.” “Precisely so,” said Tom. ‘He might look into it a dozen times uf he liked, and still he should not see all that it held. But we will 0 upstairs again, and the mystery shall be elucidated.”’ So they went upstairs again to Edith’s dressing-room, and Tom flung wide open the doors of the wardrobe. The ladies had seen ‘similar articles of furniture scores of times before, and this one seemed anno wise different from any other. There was a shelf near the top; and below the shelf were the usual pegs, on which to hang articles of ‘clothing: and that was all. Disappointment was plainly visible on vevery face. Tom smiled, and gave one of the brass pegs a downward pull. As he did so, they could hear the click of a little bolt as it shot back into ats socket. Then the back of the wardrobe, from the shelf downwards, yielding to Tom’s hand, opened slowly outwards on hidden hinges, disclosing, as it did so, a space sufficiently large for a man to stand supright in between itself—when shut—and the real back. In order to illustrate thoroughly the use to which it was intended to ‘put it, Tom stepped into the recess, and pulling the false back towards dim, shut himself in. Seeing the wardrobe thus, no one would ever ‘ave suspected that anything was hidden init. By pulling a ring, the @erson inside could open the door of his temporary prison, so that any zone could step in and out at will, and almost as easily as if were simply going out of one room into another. Tom then explained the mechanism of the wardrobe, so that there could be no possible mistake -should the necessity for using it ever arise. The recess in which the ‘wardrobe stood was a very deep one, and this it was which had first ‘given him the idea of utilizing it in the way described. ““'This is the place in which I intend to hide Lionel Dering,” said “Tom, as he shut the wardrobe doors, ‘‘should his innocence not be proved at his trial, and should I succeed in effecting his escape from Duxley gaol.” } ‘“‘But about his escape,” said Mrs. Garside. “ May I ask ‘then she stopped. | “Don’t ask me anything at present, my dear madam,” said Tom, =‘ My scheme is hardly clear to my own mind as yet.” Then, turning to Edith, he added, ‘‘ But for all that, I hope that a day or two more ewill see it thoroughly perfected. ‘Time enough then to trouble-you. with whatever other details it may be necessary for you to know.” , ” and Gomicbooks (E(0)