"I wonder if I was in time?" he muttered.
The big machinery hall was now alive with detectives.
"Take charge of every man," Ela ordered; "see that nobody touches any of these switches. Arrest stokers and keep them apart. Now you," he said, addressing the foreman in Italian, "you seem a decent fellow, and I am going to give you a chance of earning not only your freedom, but a substantial reward. I am a police officer and I have come to make an inspection of this house. You spoke of the lower rooms—do you know the way there?"
The man hesitated.
"The lift cannot work, signor," he said, with a shrug of his shoulders, "now that the electric current is stopped."
"Is there no other way?"
Again the man hesitated.
"There are stairs, signor," he stammered after a while, then continued rapidly: "If this is a crime and Signor Moole is an anarchist, I know nothing of it, I swear to you by the Virgin. I am an honest man from Padua, and I have no knowledge of such things as your Excellency speaks about."
Ela nodded.