“There is one thing more I should tell you,” Mr. Johnson concluded. “It was my intention, before I heard of Gregory Ballaston’s impending departure, to deal with this matter myself. I have a young man from a private detective agency stationed down at Ballaston. He watches, however, for one purpose only.”
“Unless you have any special reason for not telling me,” the Chief Constable suggested, “I think, especially as we are going to act, I had better know what that one purpose is.”
“I anticipate at some time or another,” Mr. Johnson confided, “a burglarious visit at the Great House from some one at Ballaston. Now that I have discovered that the Image has already been stolen the possibility is not so great, but it is obvious that as yet Gregory Ballaston has not learned the secret of helping himself to the treasure. Now there is one room—an annex to the study—locked and boarded, on the windows of which Miss Endacott has had bars placed. I believed that the Image was in there, but what certainly is there is the coffer of Chinese manuscripts which Endacott brought home with him, and which we believed to contain instructions as to the connection between the Images and the treasure. I have examined that room, and, though of course a professional burglar could manage it easily enough, it wouldn’t be a simple matter for an amateur to tackle. Still, having gone so far, I expect Gregory Ballaston to make the last effort. That is why my young man watches Ballaston Hall at night.”
Major Holmes was a matter-of-fact man of limited vision, and once more he had the sensation of having been plunged into a world of phantasies.
“Chinese manuscripts!” he muttered. “Images! Greg Ballaston! Finest captain Oxford ever had, you know, Mr. Johnson, and captained the Gentlemen two years. It’s awfully hard for me to get a coherent grip of this, especially when you sit there and tell me that you lived in the East disguised as a Chinaman. The whole thing seems fantastic.”
Mr. Johnson tapped with his forefinger the slip of paper upon which he had written the two addresses.
“When you take up my references with the lawyers,” he suggested, “write to Mr. Stockton personally. Ask him his opinion of me as a man of business, a practical man. You can have him down, if you like. My affairs are of some importance to him and he would not hesitate to make the journey. You must have confidence in me, because now that I have moved in the matter at all, I wish to be sure of the end.”
Major Holmes rose to his feet and opened the door for his visitor.
“You can rely upon my taking the necessary steps in the matter,” he promised. “The whole business is more painful to me than I can tell you, but it will proceed from now on automatically. I will send Inspector Cloutson in to see you the first time he is at Market Ballaston.”
Mr. Johnson, as he walked down the hill from the Castle, glanced more than once at the grim jail with its fortress-like walls and bare windows. He was no sentimentalist. Fifteen years’ trading upon the Yun-Tse River had accustomed him to scenes of horror and bloodshed, but, nevertheless, he gave a little shiver as he passed the nail-studded entrance. It was here, only a week ago, that a man had been hanged. He recalled the circumstances, only to dismiss the memory immediately. He was concerned with more immediate events. He himself had started into relentless motion the cumbersome machinery of the law. The memory of the Chief Constable’s room waxed faint. The tolling of the Castle clock startled him. He glanced up. Above was the scaffold.