"Not at all, sir."
Mr. Downing pondered. Jackson! The boy bore him a grudge. The boy was precisely the sort of boy to revenge himself by painting the dog Sammy. And, gadzooks! The boy whom he had pursued last night had been just about Jackson's size and build!
Mr. Downing was as firmly convinced at that moment that Mike's had been the hand to wield the paintbrush as he had ever been of anything in his life.
"Smith!" he said excitedly.
"On the spot, sir," said Psmith affably.
"Where are Jackson's shoes?"
There are moments when the giddy excitement of being right on the trail causes the amateur (or Watsonian) detective to be incautious. Such a moment came to Mr. Downing then. If he had been wise, he would have achieved his object, the getting a glimpse of Mike's shoes, by a devious and snaky route. As it was, he rushed straight on.
"His shoes, sir? He has them on. I noticed them as he went out just now."
"Where is the pair he wore yesterday?"
"Where are the shoes of yesteryear?" murmured Psmith to himself. "I should say at a venture, sir, that they would be in the basket, downstairs. Edmund, our genial knife-and-boot boy, collects them, I believe, at early dawn."