This was Stangeist's house--he could just make out the building as it loomed up a shadowy, irregular shape, perhaps two hundred yards back from the fence.
The house was quite dark, not a light showed in any window.

Jimmie Dale sat down casually on the fence, looked carefully again up and down the road--then, swinging his legs over, quick now in every action, he dropped to the other side, and stole silently across the grass to the rear of the house.
Here he stopped again, reached up to a window that was about on a level with his shoulders, and tested its fastenings.

The window--it was the window of Stangeist's private sanctum, according to the plan in her letter--was securely locked.

Jimmie Dale's hands went into his pocket--and the black silk mask was slipped over his face.

He listened intently--then a little steel instrument began to gnaw like a rat.
A minute passed--two of them.