“Oh, to be sure. Geary Street, of course. Well, let me know if anything turns up. Keep a close watch on things.”
Dicky looked at me in some apparent perplexity as I walked up the stair to my Clay Street office, but gave only some laughing answer as he turned back.
But I was in far from a laughing humor myself. The problem of paying the men raised fresh prospects of trouble, and I reflected grimly that if the money was not found I might be in more danger from my unpaid mercenaries than from the enemy.
Ten o'clock passed, and eleven, with no sign from Doddridge Knapp, and I wondered if the news I had carried him of the activities of Terrill and of Decker had disarranged his plans.
I tried the door into Room 16. It was locked, and no sound came to my ears from behind it.
“I should really like to know,” I thought to myself, “whether Mr. Doddridge Knapp has left any papers in his desk that might bear on the Wilton mystery.”
I tried my keys, but none of them fitted the lock. I gave up the attempt—indeed, my mind shrank from the idea of going through my employer's papers—but the desire of getting a key that would open the door was planted in my brain.
Twelve o'clock came. No Doddridge Knapp had appeared, and I sauntered down to the Exchange to pick up any items of news. It behooved me to be looking out for Doddridge Knapp's movements. If he had got another agent to carry out his schemes, I should have to prepare my lines for attack from another direction.
Wallbridge was just coming rapidly out of the Exchange.
“No,” said the little man, mopping the perspiration from his shining head, “quiet as lambs to-day. Their own mothers wouldn't have known the Board from a Sunday-school.”