Part 26 (2/2)
”Nothing!--always excepting a safe,” a.s.sented Mr. Milsey.
”Well, we don't suppose our friend next door keeps an article of that description on his premises,” said Davidge cheerfully. ”But we expect he's got a desk, or a private drawer, or something of that nature in which we may find a few little matters of interest and importance--it's curious, Mr. Triffitt--we're constantly taking notice of it in the course of our professional duties--it's curious how men will keep by them bits of paper that they ought to throw into the fire, and objects that they'd do well to cast into the Thames! Ah!--I've known one case in which a mere sc.r.a.p of a letter hanged a man, and another in which a bit of string got a chap fifteen years of the very best--fact, sir! You never know what you may come across during a search.”
”You're going to search his rooms?” asked Triffitt.
”Something of that sort,” replied Davidge. ”Just a look round, you know, and a bit of a peep into his private receptacles.”
”Then--you're suspecting him in connection with this----” began Triffitt.
Davidge stopped him with a look, and slowly drank off the contents of his gla.s.s. Then he rose.
”We'll talk of those matters later,” he said significantly. ”Now that my gentleman's safely away I think we'll set to work. It'll take a bit of time. And first of all, Mr. Triffitt, we'll examine your balcony door--I know enough about these modern flats to know that everything's pretty much alike in them as regards fittings, and if your door's easy to open, so will the door of the next be. Now we'll just let Jim there go outside with his apparatus, and we'll lock your balcony door on him, and then see if he finds any difficulty in getting in. To it, Jim!”
Mr. Milsey, thus adjured, went out on the balcony with his little case and was duly locked out. Within two minutes he opened the door and stepped in with a satisfied grin.
”Easy as winking!” said Mr. Milsey. ”It's what you might call one of your penny plain locks, this--and t'other'll be like it. No difficulty about this job, anyway.”
”Then we'll get to work,” said Davidge. ”Mr. Triffitt, I can't ask you to come with us, because that wouldn't be according to etiquette. Sit you down and read your book and smoke your pipe and drink your drop--and maybe we'll have something to tell you when our job's through.”
”You've no fear of interruption?” asked Triffitt, who would vastly have preferred action to inaction. ”Supposing--you know how things do and will turn out sometimes--supposing he came back?”
Davidge shook his head and smiled grimly and knowingly.
”No,” he said. ”He'll not come back--at least, if he did, we should be well warned. I've more than one man at work on this job, Mr. Triffitt, and if his lords.h.i.+p changed the course of his arrangements and returned this way, one of my chaps would keep him in conversation while another hurried up here to give us the office by a few taps on the outer door.
No!--we're safe enough. Sit you down and don't bother about us. Come on, Jim--we'll get to it.”
Triffitt tried to follow the detective's advice--he was just then deep in a French novel of the high-crime order, and he picked it up when the two men had gone out on the balcony and endeavoured to get interested in it. But he speedily discovered that the unravelling of crime on paper was nothing like so fascinating as the actual partic.i.p.ation in detection of crime in real life, and he threw the book aside and gave himself up to waiting. What were those two doing in Burchill's rooms? What were they finding? What would the result be?
Certainly Davidge and his man took their time. Eight o'clock came and went--nine o'clock, ten o'clock followed and sped into the past, and they were still there. It was drawing near to eleven, and they had been in those rooms well over three hours, when a slight sound came at Triffitt's window and Davidge put his head in, to be presently followed by Milsey. Milsey looked as innocent as ever, but it seemed to Triffitt that Davidge looked grave.
”Well?” said Triffitt. ”Any luck?”
Davidge drew the curtains over the balcony window before he turned and answered this question.
”Mr. Triffitt,” he said, when at last he faced round, ”you'll have to put us up for the night. After what I've found, I'm not going to lose sight, or get out of touch with this man. Now listen, and I'll tell you, at any rate, something. Tomorrow morning at ten o'clock there's to be a sort of informal inquiry at Mr. Halfpenny's office into the matter of a will of the date of Jacob Herapath's--all the parties concerned are going to meet there, and I know that this man Burchill is to be present.
I don't propose to lose sight of him after he returns here tonight until he goes to that office--what happens after he's once there, you shall see. So Milsey and I'll just have to trouble you to let me stop here for the night. You can go to your bed, of course--we'll sit up.
I'll send Milsey out to buy a bit of supper for us--I dare say he'll find something open close by.”
”No need,” Triffitt hastened to say. ”I've a cold meat pie, uncut, and plenty of bread, and cheese. And there's bottled ale, and whisky, and I'll get you some supper ready at once. So”--he went on, as he began to bustle about--”you did find--something?”
Davidge rubbed his hands and winked first at Milsey and then at Triffitt.
”Wait till tomorrow!” he said. ”There'll be strange news for you newspaper gentlemen before tomorrow night.”
CHAPTER XXII
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