One evening, just as dark was falling, in a many-windowed room of a long, low building standing within the shelter of a cliff high up on a lonely mountainside, were seated three men. The building was the only structure in that profound solitude, and was so high and so far removed that from the habitations in the village below it required a good pair of binoculars to pick up with any accuracy the beginning of the winding road which led up to it.
The three men were talking earnestly and, although they must have been aware that by no possibility could they be overheard, their voices, as if from force of habit, were pitched in low tones.