"A sort of speculator in precious stones," said Ashton-Kirk, to Bat. "He buys and sells; and his buying is not always aboveboard. He is also a pawnbroker in a large way."
"I see," said Bat.
"There is a glass in the door of the place," proceeded Danny, eagerly, "glass that you can see through. And I could look through the keyhole of the office I was in right into Mr. Quigley's."
"Quigley's!" said Bat, anxiously, for this was the name he had caught in the excited conversation between Fenton and Hutchinson.
"That's the name of the man who keeps the diamond place," Danny informed him. "There was little boxes, like stalls, right up at a counter, and all with doors on them. People went into these, and then nobody could see who they were. Mr. Quigley would stand back of the counter and talk to them; you could see him, all right, and the safe where he keeps his money and watches and things. There was a good many people went in—some of them ladies—and I thought I'd get a sore eye from peeping through the keyhole; but there wasn't anybody," to Ashton-Kirk, "like the one you told me about."
"You are sure?" asked the investigator.
"Now wait!" begged Danny, who had no desire to spoil the effect of his story by over-haste. "At noon time the waiter from the lunch place came up and handed me in the eats you said he would. While I was feeding myself, I stood up close, to the door so's I could hear if any one stopped at the shop across the way. If they didn't, then I didn't have to peep."
"A good idea," approved Ashton-Kirk.
"So that's what I done after that," said Danny. "When I heard anybody open Quigley's door I looked out to see if it was the lady you wanted. After a while I heard somebody walk down the hall and stop outside my door. They didn't go in at the diamond place, and they didn't go on along down the hall, so I peeped to see who it was. I knowed it would be a man, because he walked so heavy.
"But he stood so close up to my door that I could see only a piece of his back; after a bit, though, he got across the hall, and I had a good shot at him; he was kind of bent over and was looking into Quigley's, too. While he was there I heard somebody else coming, and this time it was a lady, because she came click-click-click like ladies do with their high heels. And as soon as he heard the noise, the man at the door of the diamond place beat it along the hall in a hurry. And then the lady went into Quigley's."