“But even Jennins will have to admit that a leaning towards Art comes in very useful sometimes,” he thought, as he once more hid the scrawled message from view.
It was long past eight when the detective returned to his flat, only to find that there was still no answer to his telegram to Boulogne.
“Nothing has come and no one has been to see us since you went out, sir,” Higgs told him.
Higgs always spoke of himself as “us” when he was engaged on Gimblet’s affairs, just as he alluded, with a fine impartiality, to matters in which his master alone was concerned as “ours.”
“They’ve been ringing us up from the Yard,” he went on, “been ringing every few minutes for the last half-hour, and said I was to ask you to speak to them on the telephone the minute you come in. There they go again,” he concluded, as the bell tinkled violently in the library at the same moment as there came a ring at the front door.
Gimblet hurried to the instrument and Higgs went to answer the door.
“Are you there?”
“Yes, is that Mr. Gimblet? Hold the line, please, sir.”
In a moment Jennins’ voice sounded in his ear.
“Mr. Gimblet, that you? Oh, Mr. Gimblet, our man has wired from Boulogne and it appears that things have taken a very unexpected turn. I daresay you’ve seen an evening paper?”