It seemed to take considerable strength to accomplish his purpose, and it was several seconds before he slid the front of the leg around, disclosing an opening in it some ten inches long and three wide. This part of the table leg was hollow.
“There is the place, Carter. You see that it is empty.”
“Has anything about the table been forced?” asked the detective. “Or was the table leg opened in the same way that you did it just now, by pressing certain buttons and unscrewing part of the leg?”
“Nothing has been injured, so far as I can see,” returned Bentham. “Let me show you just how it works.”
He took out the table drawer again, and Nick Carter, flash light in hand, peered under the table. It did not take him a moment to understand the ingenious contrivance.
“You see, what adds to the security of this table-leg cupboard, is that the drawer must not only be taken out, but also put back, before the opening can be made,” said Bentham. “It is not the kind of thing that could be discovered accidentally.”
“That is apparent,” agreed Nick. “Whoever stole those papers knew just how to get at them. Would you mind asking Miss Bentham to come into the library for a few moments?”
“I will do so if you wish it,” was the reply. “But Clarice cannot help us. She did not know anything about the papers being gone till I told her, and she had no idea even then of their great importance.”
He rang the bell as he spoke, and in a minute a fresh-looking maid came in and looked inquiringly at Matthew Bentham.
Nick Carter decided that it would be hard to suspect this maid of being mixed up in the affair. Obviously, she was the sort of girl who would attend to her work conscientiously, and think of nothing else after it was done except her personal affairs—new clothes, and so forth.