“Well, what is it?” said the trooper. He glanced suspiciously at the door and took a step towards it.
“Here,” said Darby, sinking his voice to a mysterious pitch. “Come inside; I don’t want anyone to see me show this.” He glanced round the room again, and inspiration came to him. These chaps was always interested in Steve, so——
“D’you know whose bunk that is—was?” he asked, jerking a finger at one of the bunks ranged round the wall.
“Is—was? D’you mean Steve’s?” asked the trooper, with suddenly aroused interest.
Darby restrained himself from uttering the usual formula. He nodded. “That’s what I want to show you,” he said. The trooper approached the bunk curiously. “What about it?” he asked. “See anything in it?” said Darby, hugely pleased with himself. This was simple, he thought. “Blankets,” said the trooper, and ran his hand over them. “Anything else?” said Darby, sitting down and crossing his legs complacently. The minutes were flying steadily. The trooper jerked the blankets off the bunk, and after a look at Darby suddenly hauled the mattress up and ran his hand underneath. He had vague thoughts of finding the weapon which did the deed, or something equally important. He found nothing. “There’s nothing ’ere,” he said, “excep’ blankets an’ mattress.”
“Like to see what’s inside the mattress?” asked Darby, smoothly. The trooper felt it all over. He turned it over and felt it again. He occupied two or three minutes in convincing himself there was nothing there but straw.
“There’s nothin’ in it but straw, far’s I can make out,” he said, with a puzzled look at Darby, sitting there and smiling contentedly at him. “Wot’s the game?”
“Now wot d’you think could be in wi’ straw in a mattress that you couldn’t feel from the outside?” asked Darby. The trooper thought it over. “Papers—a letter?” said the trooper, excitedly. “Papers, or a letter,” agreed Darby, with great satisfaction. He had been vainly racking his brain to think of something to suggest himself. The trooper whipped a knife out and slit the end of the mattress open, and commenced to grope in it. It was well over the five minutes, but Darby watched him, with the greatest interest in what he would suggest next, or do when he found there was nothing. But the trooper suddenly raised his head. He had heard the faint far-off click of a horse’s hoof on a stone. Darby heard it the same moment, and with one stride was beside the trooper.
“Show ’im something, an’ persuade ’im to stay for five minutes,” thought Darby, with a sudden spasm of doubt as to whether that meant five minutes for each item or for both.
“It’s all right,” he said to the trooper. “I just want to persuade you to stop ’ere a minute or two longer.”