The Strange Boarders of Palace Crescent by E. Phillips Oppenheim

Three o'clock struck from the Hammersmith clock as Roger Ferrison, with a sigh of relief, closed his eyes. In five minutes he was asleep. At four o'clock precisely the same clock was striking the hour. He sat up in bed with a half-strangled exclamation. He had been sleeping so heavily that for the moment he scarcely remembered where he was or what had awakened him. Then he heard it again--a police whistle, shrill, piercing, ominous.

Still only half awake but thrilled by that tragic sound, he sprang out of bed and hastened to his wide-open window. The sound, he was convinced, had come from somewhere quite near. There were nowhere any signs of life and the darkness was unbroken. He seemed to be looking downwards into a vault of emptiness. Paying the minimum rate, his room was naturally at the back of the house. It was, in fact, little better than an attic. He had never even troubled to look out. He listened intently. It was the quietest hour of the night, or rather early morning. Traffic was almost suspended upon the nearby main road. It was the period between the coming home of the belated and the sailing out of the early. For a moment he was strongly tempted to get back to bed and pull down his windows. He had had enough excitement, he told himself, for one day. All the time, however, he found himself hurrying on his clothes. A police whistle was a thing which could not be disregarded. He crept down the three flights of stairs noiselessly, feeling his way. On the ground floor he ventured to kindle his briquet. A stroke of luck befell him. On the corner of the alcove was the electric torch which Mrs. Dewar had been carrying earlier in the evening. He picked it up, turned it on and, shading it with his hand, passed down the passage, taking care to push back the baize door noiselessly. He passed Flora Quayne's room, descended some more steps, passed through what was evidently the kitchen and reached the scullery. Here he came to a sudden halt. Lying in an uneasy posture close to the back door, on a rough mattress with a cushion for a pillow, was the long, spiderlike form of Joseph in his vest and trousers. He was apparently fast asleep and snoring. Roger's first idea was, naturally enough, to wake him. He stooped down with that intention. Suddenly he paused. By the side of the sleeping man's hand, almost within reach of the grip of his fingers, was an apparently new and obviously expensive revolver. Roger picked it up and examined it curiously. It was a small but a villainously effective weapon and it was fitted with a modern silencer. Whilst he was in the act of examining it, there was a sudden growl from the floor, almost like the growl of a wild beast. Joseph was sitting up. He seized Roger's hand and wrenched away the weapon. He was no longer the well-trained servant. His white face was convulsed with fury.