The graceful little figure stepped forward and stood at Wise’s side as he looked the hall over. He tapped at the panelled walls, and smiled as he said, “Solid and intact. No secret passage or sliding panel,—of that I’m sure.”
“If you’re trying to find a secret entrance into the house, Mr. Wise,” Landon said, “you are wasting your time. I am more or less architecturally inclined, and I’ve tapped and sounded and measured and calculated,—and I can assure you there’s nothing of the sort.”
“Good work! That saves me some trouble, I’m sure. Marvellous work on these doors, eh? And the bronze columns,—from abroad, I take it.”
“Yes;” Professor Hardwick said, slapping his hand against one of the fluted bronze pillars, “I admire these columns more than the doors even. They’re unique, I don’t wonder their owner ‘built a house behind them.’ I doubt if their match is in America.”
“And the locks and bolts are as ponderous as the doors,” commented the detective. “Eh, Zizi?”
“They are like that all over the house,” said the girl, in a casual tone. “Even the kitchen quarters are as securely fastened and bolted. And upstairs, any doors that give on balconies are strongly guarded. I have never seen a house more carefully looked after in the matter of barricades.”
The girl spoke slowly, as if on the witness stand. Then suddenly her black eyes twinkled, and she turned sharply toward Eve, saying, “Oh, do you do that, too?”
“Do what?” cried Eve, angrily. “What do you mean?”
“Scribble notes, and pass ’em to somebody. I do, too. It’s a habit I can’t seem to break myself of.”
“I didn’t!” and Eve’s face flushed and her eyes glittered with a smouldering fire.