Your
other question is not worth answering. How do you suppose that I
know these things? It's my business to get to know them, and that's
all there is to it. As a matter of fact, Lady Lochmaben has just
as good diamonds as Mrs. Carruthers ever had; and the chances are
that she keeps them where Mrs. Carruthers kept hers, if you could
enlighten me on that point."
As it happened, I could, since I knew from his niece that it was
one on which Mr. Carruthers had been a faddist in his time. He
had made quite a study of the cracksman's craft, in a resolve to
circumvent it with his own. I remembered myself how the ground-floor
windows were elaborately bolted and shuttered, and how the doors of
all the rooms opening upon the square inner hall were fitted with
extra Yale locks, at an unlikely height, not to be discovered by one
within the room. It had been the butler's business to turn and to
collect all these keys before retiring for the night. But the key
of the safe in the study was supposed to be in the jealous keeping
of the master of the house himself. That safe was in its turn so
ingeniously hidden that I never should have found it for myself.
Pages:
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28