It was the latter who first spoke. He came forward, towards Alfred Head. “Well,” he said rather sternly, “I presume that you’ve been able to get nothing from the old woman?”
And Mr. Head answered glibly enough, “That’s quite correct, sir. There is evidently nothing to be got out of her. As you yourself said, sir, not long ago, this old woman has only been a tool.”
The two policemen were now walking one each side of him, and it seemed to Alfred Head as if he were being hustled along towards the hall where there generally stood, widely open, the doors leading out on to the steps to the Market Place.
He told himself that he would be very glad to get out into the open air and collect his thoughts. He did not believe that his old fellow-countrywoman would, to use a vulgar English colloquialism, “give him away.” But still, he would not feel quite at ease till she was safely deported and out of the way.
The passage was rather a long one, and he began to feel a curious, nervous craving to reach the end of it—to be, that is, out in the hall.
But just before they reached the end of the passage the men about him closed round Alfred Head. He felt himself seized, it seemed to him from every side, not roughly, but with a terribly strong muscular grip.
“What is this?” he cried in a loud voice. Even as he spoke, he wondered if he could be dreaming—if this was the horrible after effect of the strain he had just gone through.
For a moment only he struggled, and then, suddenly, he submitted. He knew what it was he wished to save; it was the watch chain to which were attached the two keys of the safe in his bedroom. He wore them among a bunch of old-fashioned Georgian seals which he had acquired in the way of business, and he had had the keys gilt, turned to a dull gold colour, to match the seals. It was possible, just possible, that they might escape the notice of these thick-witted men about him.
“What does this mean?” he demanded; and then he stopped, for there rose a distant sound of crying and screaming in the quiet place.
“What is that?” he cried, startled.