Fortunately it was a black, heavy day, the kind when the lights shine out in dark offices and people come to the windows and yank up the shades. If anyone did notice them they'd have looked like a couple of men searching for a leak, especially as they were busy in one spot—the space below the two windows marked by the burnt ends of the matches O'Mally had dropped.
And here, with the scattered matches all around it, caught in a ledge just above the gutter, they made the greatest find of all—a scarf pin. It was a star sapphire set in a twist of gold and platinum. An hour after they had it in their possession it was identified by George and Mr. Whitney as one they had seen on Johnston Barker the morning of January fifteenth.
From the tailor came further testimony. He identified the button as made from a new mould, the first consignment of which he had received late in December. So far he had only used it on two suits, one for a mining man from Nevada and the other for Johnston Barker—a dark brown cheviot with a reddish line. This had been the suit Barker had on when he visited the Whitney office that morning.
When he came to the end of all this I was balanced on the edge of the sofa, with my feet braced on the floor to keep from sliding off and my eyes glued on my loving spouse.
"Do you mean he came down from one window to the other, Soapy?"
Babbitts nodded:
"Lowering himself by a rope fastened to the upper cleat which his weight loosened."
"But—my goodness!" I was aghast at the idea. "A man of Barker's age dangling down along the wall that you could see for miles!"
"You couldn't have seen him twenty feet off. The wall's dark and it was a black dark night. If you'd been watching with a glass you couldn't have made out anything at that height and at that hour."
"But the danger of it?"