The broken glass had been already cleared from the frame over the mantelpiece; therefore, as soon as I touched the carved rose on the left-hand side, the framework moved up. I touched the spring beneath and the door in the wall flew open; there within was the steel safe, exactly as I had seen it last, Don Juan turned to me with a look of solicitude.
"Don't feel offended, Anstruther," he began, "at what I was going to say, but it is essential that I should open this safe in the presence of Mr. Fowler alone."
As he took the key from my hands and inserted it in the lock, I bowed and left them.
For half an hour I paced the passage without or wandered through the back door into the neglected garden, which I found abutted on a disused graveyard—a very common object, met with often in startlingly unlikely places in one's walks in Bath.
It was on my return from one of these little rambles that I found the door of the old lady's sitting-room open, and Don Juan and Mr. Fowler superintending the removal of the safe by two porters; a third gentleman had now joined the party.
"This is Mr. Symonds of the Bank of England," said the old Don ceremoniously. "He has very kindly undertaken the removal of this safe to London."
I was getting now so used to the Don's mysterious movements that even this did not surprise me. I noticed, however, that the safe had been very carefully sealed in addition to being locked. The safe was carried up to the street and placed on the front seat of a large motor car which was waiting.
In this the representative of the Bank of England quickly entered, and two very unmistakable detectives who had been standing by mounted on the front seat, then the motor puffed away.
"They won't stop now," remarked Mr. Fowler, "until they reach
Threadneedle Street."
Within a quarter of an hour Don Juan and I were back in his private room at the hotel.