A slight tremor passed through his portly frame before he forced himself to speak.
"Mr. Latham had emptied his pockets, sir, as if he were making ready to go to bed. All the change and the keys were lying on the mantelpiece. One would think he had been kidnapped. Of course it can't be," he added in a low, intense tone.
"Do you mean to say he disappeared without his hat?" asked the doctor.
"No, sir, hat and cloak aren't there." And to the doctor's further questions Spire confessed that he had spoken to no one in the house that morning. He would only have been told lies. He did not think much of the people in the inn.
"So I took the liberty of speaking to you, sir. Mr. Latham may turn up any moment and I don't know that he would like to find that I have been to the police already."
"No, perhaps he wouldn't," assented the doctor reflectively.
"That's just it, sir," murmured Spire. "Mr. Cosmo is a very peculiar young gentleman. He doesn't like notice to be taken."
"Doesn't he? Well then, you had better wait before you go to the police. We had better give him till four o'clock."
"Very well, sir," said Spire, fighting down his feeling that nothing in the world would be worse than this waiting. The doctor nodded dismissal, then at the last moment:
"By the by, hadn't you better look up all the papers that may be lying about?"