An Awkward Predicament

As I said, a fortnight had passed, and the fruit-picking was at its
height as far as pears and apples went, when one night, after a very hot
day, when the cart was waiting in the yard, loaded up high with bushel
and half-bushel baskets, and the horse was enjoying his corn, and
rattling his chain by the manger, I left Old Brownsmith smoking his pipe
and reading a seed-list, and strolled out into the garden.

It was a starlight night, and very cool and pleasant, as I went down one
of the paths and then back along another, trying to make out the
blossoms of the nasturtiums that grew so thickly along the borders just
where I was.

The air smelt so sweet and fresh that it seemed to do me good, but I was
thinking that I must be getting back into the house and up to my bed,
when the fancy took me that I should like to go down the path as far as
Mrs Beeton's house, and look at the window where I used to sit when
Shock pelted me with clay.

The path was made with ashes, so that my footsteps were very quiet, and
as I walked in the shadow of a large row of pear-trees I was almost
invisible. In fact I could hardly see my own hand.

All at once I stopped short, for I heard a peculiar scratching noise and
a whispering, and, though I could hardly distinguish anything, I was
perfectly sure that somebody had climbed to the top of the wall, and was
sitting there with a leg over our side, for I heard it rustling amongst
the plum boughs.