I laid the same row of holes over the next line, with no results that were intelligible. The second row was no more fruitful, but the third gave this result.
“an EArly opportunity of stuDying them thoroughlY.”
Put together the two lines of indicated letters read—
“PAPERS READY”—easy enough for Macaulay’s schoolboy to understand. “Papers Ready.”
“I’m not a stupid ass after all,” I exclaimed, triumphantly. “Now we want our considering caps. This means that some important information which the writer of this letter has obtained is waiting to be delivered, and what we have to do is to get hold of them.”
“It’s not in my line,” said Burroughs.
“I’m going to sleep over it. We’re not likely to have any more callers, so I shall go to bed;” and to bed I went, leaving him on watch, as he declared he should sit up till daylight.
In the morning I decided what to do. It was clear that the papers were too important to be trusted by Dagara to any one but a duly selected messenger. The care with which the message was sent to Vasco that they were ready, suggested that he was not that messenger. Why then should he be told about them? Probably he had to send the messenger for them.
I thought it over carefully, revolving all I knew, and by the process of exclusion decided it was Miralda. It must be some one whom Vasco could see at any time, the moment the message reached him. Even with Inez, of whom I thought first, this was not practicable. It might be some fellow-officer; but no one of them would be so invariably within immediate touch as Miralda.
Moreover, it was just the thing for which she could be used to the best advantage. Dagara was married I knew, and thus she would only have to pay an informal visit to the wife for him to meet her and hand over any papers. Then I recalled that Inez had been one of the first to see that forged letter of mine which Dagara had given up, and the conclusion was easy that when Miralda obtained anything, she handed it on to Inez for the latter to give to Barosa.