The Waldgrave had seen him in the town, and had even spoken to him. What if it were he who occupied this house close by the New Gate, with a convenient secretive entrance, and used it for his machinations? Marie might well have fallen into his hands. She might be in his power now, behind the very walls on which I gazed.
From that moment I breathed and lived only to see the inside of that house. Nothing else would satisfy me. I scanned it with greedy eyes, its steep gable, its four windows one above another, its carved weather-boards. I might attack it on this side; or by way of the alley and door. But I quickly discarded the latter idea. Though I had seen only the old woman, I judged that there were defenders in the background, and in the solitude of the alley I might be easily despatched. It remained to enter from the front, or by way of the roof. I pondered a moment, and then I went across to Herr Krapp's and knocked.
He opened the door himself. I almost pushed my way in. 'What do you want, my friend?' he said, recoiling before me, and looking somewhat astonished.
'To get into your neighbour's house,' I answered bluntly.
He had a light in his hand, and he held it up to my face. 'So?' he said. 'Is that what you would be at? But you go fast. It takes two to that, Master Steward.'
'Yes,' I answered. 'I am the one, and you are the other, Herr Krapp.'
He turned from me and closed the door, and, coming back, held the light again to my face. 'So you still think that it was your lady's woman you saw at the window?'
He set down his light on a chair and, leaning against the wall, seemed to consider me. After a pause, 'And you have been to the house?'
'Then what do you want to do now?' he asked, softly rubbing his chin.
'To enter it from yours,' I answered. 'Surely you have some dormer, some trap-door, some roof-way, by which a bold man may get from this house to the next one.'
He shook his head. 'I know of none,' he said. 'But that is not all. You are asking a strange thing. I am a peaceful man, and, I hope, a good neighbour; and this which you ask me to do cannot be called neighbourly. However, I need say the less about it, because the thing cannot be done.'
He seemed to reflect. In the end he made a strange answer. 'What time did you call at the house?' he said.