“It’s all along of them blarsted papers that The Avenger went to work a different way this time,” said Chandler slowly.
Bunting had pushed a tin of sardines towards his guest, and was eagerly listening. “How d’you mean?” he asked. “I don’t take your meaning, Joe.”
“Well, you see, it’s this way. The newspapers was always saying how extraordinary it was that The Avenger chose such a peculiar time to do his deeds—I mean, the time when no one’s about the streets. Now, doesn’t it stand to reason that the fellow, reading all that, and seeing the sense of it, said to himself, ‘I’ll go on another tack this time’? Just listen to this!” He pulled a strip of paper, part of a column cut from a newspaper, out of his pocket:
“‘AN EX-LORD MAYOR OF LONDON ON THE AVENGER
“‘Will the murderer be caught? Yes,’ replied Sir John, ‘he will certainly be caught—probably when he commits his next crime. A whole army of bloodhounds, metaphorical and literal, will be on his track the moment he draws blood again. With the whole community against him, he cannot escape, especially when it be remembered that he chooses the quietest hour in the twenty-four to commit his crimes.
“‘Londoners are now in such a state of nerves—if I may use the expression, in such a state of funk—that every passer-by, however innocent, is looked at with suspicion by his neighbour if his avocation happens to take him abroad between the hours of one and three in the morning.’
“I’d like to gag that ex-Lord Mayor!” concluded Joe Chandler wrathfully.
Just then the lodger’s bell rang.
“Let me go up, my dear,” said Bunting.
His wife still looked pale and shaken by the fright she had had.
“No, no,” she said hastily. “You stop down here, and talk to Joe. I’ll look after Mr. Sleuth. He may be wanting his supper just a bit earlier than usual to-day.”