Then and shrillingly, there came a signal from the other side of the villa. The head on the porch was jerked back. A burly form leaped to the grass where the driveway turned about the house. This form rebounded, stood erect, then came lumbering toward Fay and the back of the villa.
The shrill cry of warning was repeated. Fay drew himself into the smallest possible shadow. A man lunged past him. This man’s face was revealed for a moment like a flash seen on a picture screen. It was unmistakable. It was memory haunting.
“Dutch Gus,� breathed Fay, hardly daring to move. “That’s Dutch Gus.� He heard the crash of glass as the prowler stepped through a low greenhouse. A fence broke under a man’s weight in the back of the garage. Afterwards came profound silence, until a far-off dog barked and signaled the man’s passing.
Fay waited. It was barely possible that things would quiet down. He had heard no sound from the villa.
The mystery of the affair gripped him in a passive vise. Dutch Gus was the last man he had expected to see in that part of London. MacKeenon or even Sir Richard might have visited the villa. A King’s courier lived in the house, from all information. Then, asked Fay to himself, what was the connection between Dutch Gus, the lookout, Sir Richard and the owner of the villa? The entire matter was bound up in some manner with his quest after the cipher’s key.
Fay had lived alone too long to believe that the
presence of the crook in that neighborhood could be laid to chance. He had often studied the law of chances. They were infinite in the matter of meeting a friend or enemy in a strange locality. The police never caught their quarry through the chance meeting. It was always by a lead or a given direction.
He turned the problem over in his quick way as he waited for some development from the villa. He had no fear for himself. The night was too dark for pursuit. There were innumerable side lanes and turns and twists to that part of London. The constables were either asleep or dozing in sheltered nooks.
Glancing upward, after emerging from the hedge, Fay studied the windows on the side of the villa. No light shone from any of them. A light would have been an indication that Dutch Gus and his lumbering get-away had aroused the occupants.
The absence of any light was disconcerting, however. It would be equally easy for someone inside to keep watch without revealing his presence. In fancy he saw a lower curtain move. He dismissed this notion as time passed. He waited, realizing that nothing would be gained by a retreat. He was on the grounds of the villa he had been told to prowl. His coming there had frightened Dutch Gus into a bungling get-a-way, which was some satisfaction after all.