There was a smell of tobacco in his room and a vision of Lawrence with his heels on the mantelpiece smoking a cigarette. He was looking at a paragraph in an early edition of the Globe that seemed to give him satisfaction.
"So you've got back," he said. "Rather a sensational bit of copy for the papers over the inquest, eh? That pompous juryman's face was a study when Hetty and that reporter chap knocked him out of time."
"I didn't see you," said Bruce.
"All the same I was there all the time. I fetched the Countess Lalage in. As I entered I bought a copy of the Globe. The first thing that took my eye was the very strange advertisement inside by the theatrical notices."
Bruce glanced carelessly at the paragraph. Then his eye brightened. It ran as follows:
"Danger.--The danger lies in the second floor back bedroom of the corner house.--Z."
"Toujours the corner house," Bruce cried. "What do you make of it?"
Lawrence looked at his friend with a twinkle.
"I'll tell you my opinion later on," he said. "I think that after an exhibition of my marvellous powers, you can safely leave the matter to me. Should you like to have a little bit of an adventure this evening?"
Bruce replied that he was just in the frame of mind for something of the kind. He was far too restless to settle down to anything.