Then Ito spoke. “He has habit,” he explained, “of spending evening with Jane, when Mr. Kempwood suspect him to be answering door-bell, it was therefore that I remove light plug to delay Mr. Kempwood and cover retreat of Debson, since we are friends.”
“That is true,” said Jane, beginning to cry, “and I hope, sir, that you’ll not blame him, since it is my fault and----”
“That’ll do,” someone said, and she relapsed into very moist-sounding sniffs. I don’t know how the “servant class,” as aunt calls them, manage to sniff like that, for theirs is a pervasive, far-carrying sniff. But I notice that they always employ it when they are thinking of leaving, and perhaps strength comes from constant practice.
“Suppose we go down and search,” said Amy. “Probably he’s”--she pointed to S. K.’s man--“hidden it.”
I never saw such a look of outraged innocence as that man wore. “If there is any doubt,” he said, “I will request a search. I am honest.”
“Was there a blind man around?” I asked. “Did you hear of him downstairs?”
The man whom I asked--the man who had been outside--said there was. “But,” he said, “I am afraid you won’t make a detective, miss. He has been watched; he has not moved, and, since this affair, he has been searched.”
“Where was he sitting?” I asked.
“Come to think of it,” said one of the men, “I think he was sitting by a window that leads to the coal cellars.”
“They got in coal to-day,” I said. “I heard it go in. Possibly the inner window was not replaced. If the grating only was locked, my bracelet would go through that.”