"Lor' love yer, mum, not 'im—you don't catch anybody in 'is room when 'e goes out. 'E locks it up. I makes the bed and all that while 'e's there in the mornin'."
After the girl had gone up to bed, Anna sat up reading until the chimes of some near-by church clock told the hour of midnight. All was silent in No. 9, Dorrington Street. Outside, too, it was quiet, only sometimes a hansom would rattle past the front of the house, its bells jingling, and the horse's hoofs beating merrily on the asphalt.
The woman rose and looked out into the hall. On a bracket stood an evil-smelling oil-lamp turned down low. Beside it a brass tray contained the basin of consommé and a dingy little metal cruet. There were two letters there also, addressed to Mr. Gabriel, and Anna took them up to examine them.
They were in her hands when she started suddenly and put them back on the tray. There was the sound of a key being inserted in the street door below, and hastily slipping back into her room, Anna put out her light and closed the door.
She heard the man come up the stairs and unlock his door and carry the tray into his room. Then a match was struck, and with a start Anna noticed a thin streak of light break out in the darkness of the wall beside her.
She noticed then for the first time that the rooms, like those below, were separated by folding doors, but in the case of the first floor they had been fastened up, and on her side had been papered over and a heavy wardrobe placed against them.
Eagerly Anna Paluda placed her eye to the crack of light beside the massive piece of furniture, but she could see nothing. She determined that when Dasso went out on the following evening she would see what could be done to widen the crack in the papered door.