“No, no, not a penny.”
“You work for nothing, then—for the mere love of the thing?” I said, with a palpable sneer.
“Just that,” he said, swallowing the insult smilingly. “Brettle is to break into a shop in Leith Street to-night—Calderston’s, No.—. The place above enters from the Terrace, and the key of that is sent home every night by a drunken porter. Brettle will treat him on the way, get the key from him, and work inside all night. Perhaps he will stay there over the Sunday. He is to work the job single-handed, and take the plunder out by the Terrace stair in different lots.”
“And who arranged all this for him?” I asked, nailing Dick’s shifty glance with a steady stare.
“Oh, I don’t know—himself, I suppose,” he confusedly answered.
That was enough for me. I saw that Dick had arranged it all as a nice trap for Brettle. What could be his object?
“Dick,” I said suddenly, after noting down all he had revealed, “have you any idea what has become of Brettle’s wife, Pretty Polly?”
The start the man gave! and his face! I never thought that there was such a blush in him.
“Dead, I think,” he guiltily stammered, after a horrible pause.
I thought not, and said so.