"From the signal tower," he said. "I wonder what is wrong."
High above the house was one square solitary tower, in which, day and night, a watcher was stationed. Fall went to the telephone and took down the receiver. He spoke a few words and listened, then he hung up the receiver again and turned to Farrington.
"Poltavo is in Great Bradley," he said; "one of our men has seen him and signalled to the house."
"In Great Bradley!" Farrington's eyes narrowed. "What is he doing here?"
"What was his car doing here the other day," asked Fall, "when he kidnapped Frank Doughton? It was here to throw suspicion on us and take suspicion off himself, the most obvious thing in the world."
Again the buzzer sounded, and again Fall carried on a conversation with the man on the roof in a low tone.
"Poltavo is on the downs," he said; "he has evidently come to meet somebody; the look-out says he can see him from the tower through his glasses, and that there is a man making his way towards him."
"Let us see for ourselves," said Farrington.
They passed out of the room into another, opened what appeared to be a cupboard door, but which was in reality one of the innumerable elevators with which the house was furnished, and for the working of which the great electrical plant was so necessary.
They stepped into the lift, and in a few seconds had reached the interior of the tower, with its glass-paned observation windows and its telescopes. One of the foreign workmen, whom Farrington employed, was carefully scrutinizing the distant downs through a telescope which stood upon a large tripod.