On our way back to town I asked Quarles whether he expected to get the permission.
"Certainly I do. George Bryant is too greedy for money to miss such a chance."
"And do you really mean that you can find the money?"
"At any rate, I mean the Bryants to pay heavily for it if I do."
Quarles was right. Three days later the permit and the required document arrived, and we went to Norbiton.
As I had visited the house already, I was prepared to act as guide to the professor, but he showed only a feeble interest in the house itself. The only room he examined with any minuteness was the bedroom Mr. Ottershaw had used, and he seemed mainly to be proving to his own satisfaction that certain possibilities which had occurred to him were not probabilities.
"There's a ten per cent. reward hanging to this, Wigan," he chuckled. "We're out to make money on this occasion. Bryant seems to have spoken the truth. The place appears to be much as Mr. Ottershaw left it."
He had opened a cupboard in the bedroom, and took up two or three pairs of boots to look at.
"Large feet, hadn't he? Went in for comfort rather than elegance. I never saw uglier boots. But they are well made, nothing cheap about them."
"You don't expect to find the money in his boots, do you?"