“This may or may not be one of them,” said Elk. “If it is, what happened to the other two?”
But here evidence failed. The men had disappeared as though they had dissipated into air.
“We’re going to get a roasting for this, Captain Gordon,” said Elk; “and if we escape without being scorched, we’re lucky. Fortunately, nobody but ourselves knows that Hagn has been arrested; and when I say ‘ourselves,’ I wish I meant it! You had better go home and go to bed; I had some sleep in the night. If you’ll wait while I send this bleating clerk of mine home to his well-advertised wife and family, I’ll walk home with you.”
Dick was waiting on the edge of Whitehall when Elk joined him.
“There will be a departmental inquiry, of course. We can’t help that,” he said. “The only thing that worries me is that I’ve got poor old Balder into bad odour, and I was trying to put him right. I don’t know what the experience of the Boy Scouts is,” he went off at a tangent, “but my own is that the worst service you can render to any man is to try to do him a good turn.”
It was now nearly ten o’clock, and Dick was feeling faint with hunger and lack of sleep, for he had eaten nothing at Horsham. Once or twice, as they walked toward Harley Terrace, Elk looked back over his shoulder.
“Expecting anybody?” asked Dick, suddenly alive to the possibility of danger.
“No-o, not exactly,” said Elk. “But I’ve got a hunch that we’re being followed.”
“I saw a man just now who I thought was following us,” said Dick, “a man in a fawn raincoat.”
“Oh, him?” said Elk, indifferent alike to the rules of grammar and the presence of his shadow. “That is one of my men. There’s another on the other side of the road. I’m not thinking of them, my mind for the moment being fixed on Frogs. Do you mind if we cross the road?” he asked hurriedly, and, without waiting for a reply, caught Gordon’s arm and led him across the broad thoroughfare. “I always object to walking on the same side of a street as the traffic runs. I like to meet traffic; it’s not good to be overtaken. I thought so!”