“Bear in mind, Mr. Langham, that Margate rushed from the house in which we secured his confederates and ran to his suite in the Hotel Westgate, of which Clayton still is manager.”
“I know about that.”
“I then did not know that a secret electric communication existed between the very room in which we made the arrest and the apartments to which Margate had gone, nor that a signal informing him of the arrest and warning him to flee could be communicated to him by stepping on a concealed button under the carpet. I since have learned all about that. That was done by Scoville, one of the arrested crooks, unknown to me and my assistants.”
“But, Mr. Carter——”
“One moment, please,” Nick now interrupted. “I want you to see how impossible Margate’s exploit must have appeared.”
“Go on, then.”
“Only ten minutes elapsed from the time Margate left his confederates, until I entered the Westgate in pursuit of him. The first person I saw in the hotel office was, I supposed, Manager Clayton.”
“Well?”
“How could I believe anything else?” Nick went on more earnestly. “He was in the office inclosure and wearing an entirely different suit from what Margate was wearing ten minutes before. Ten minutes is an incredibly short time in which to have covered the distance between the two houses, to have gone to his suite and changed his outside garments and got down to the hotel office.”
“I admit that, Carter, of course.[Pg 4]”