A few minutes’ reflection convinced me that it was utterly out of the question for the intended robbery to succeed. Such desperate projects depend mainly on their secrecy for success. The watchmen in all the banks were instructed to be unusually vigilant, the policemen were apprised of what was suspected, a number of officers were to lounge upon the streets near at hand in citizens’ clothes, and Aristides Maxx, one of the most skillful detectives in the metropolis, was engaged upon the case.
The general belief was that the burglars, discovering what thorough preparations were on foot, would not make the attempt. That sort of gentry are not the ones to walk into any trap with their eyes open.
Respecting Detective Maxx, there was much wonderment, and the mayor was vexed that he did not show up. Some doubted his presence in Damietta, but the superior officer of the city felt that courtesy demanded that Maxx should report to him before trying to follow up any trail of his own. If he was with us, he was so effectually disguised that no one suspected his identity.
“I wonder whether that seedy, tramp-like fellow who stole the cipher dispatch, can be Detective Maxx?” said Ben to me on Wednesday night before he started for home.
“It is not impossible,” I answered, “for detectives are forced to assume all manner of disguises. He may have chosen to stroll about the city in that make-up.”
“But if it is the detective, why did he go to all the trouble of copying off the telegram by sound when he could have got it from us with the translation merely by making himself known?”
“I admit that, if he is a detective, he acts, in my judgment, in a very unprofessional way. He was so persistent in his attentions that he must have known he was sure to draw unpleasant, if not dangerous suspicion, to himself.”
“Do you know,” said Ben, with a meaning smile, “that I half believe this stranger and Burkhill are partners? They have been here at the same time, they show interest in the same thing, and like enough are working out the same scheme of robbery.”
This had never occurred to me, and I was struck with its reasonableness, when I came to think it over. The ill-favored individual signed the name “John Browning” to the dispatch which he sent some months before, as a pretext for visiting our office so much—but that was clearly an alias.
“Well,” said I, “it is all conjecture any way. With the ample warning the authorities have received, I do not believe there is the slightest prospect of a robbery being committed. I intend to retire to-morrow night at my usual hour with little fear of my slumbers being disturbed.”