Stamer had made up his mind that Oscar Leigh was in league with the police, and that this postponement of buying the gold from Timmons was merely part of some subtle plan to entrap Timmons and himself.
This conviction was his way of deciding upon taking Oscar Leigh's life. He did not even formulate the dwarfs death to himself. He had simply decided that Leigh meant to entrap Timmons in the interest of Scotland Yard. Timmons and himself were one.
Wait a week indeed, and be caught in a trap! Not he! Business was business, and no time was to be lost.
When he left Tunbridge Street that morning, he made straight for Chelsea. This was a class of business which did not oblige him to keep his head particularly clear. He would lay aside his ordinary avocation until this affair was finished. The weather was warm, so he turned into a public-house in the Vauxhall Bridge Road and sat down at a table to think the matter over while cooling and refreshing himself with a pint of beer.
One thing puzzled him. How was it that the dwarf pretended to be with Timmons half-a-mile away, at the time he himself, and half-a-dozen other men who knew Leigh's appearance thoroughly, saw him as plain as the sun at noonday winding up his clock at the second floor window of the house opposite the Hanover? There could, of course, not be the least doubt that Timmons had been deceived, imposed upon in some way. But how was it done? Timmons knew the dwarf well, knew his figure, which could not easily be mistaken, and knew his voice also. They had met several times before Timmons even broached the gold difficulty to him. Leigh had told Timmons that he was something of a magician. That he could do things no other man could do. That he had hidden knowledge of metals, and so on, and could do things no other man living could do with metals, and that he had books of fortune-telling and magic and the stars, and so on.
Stamer's education had been neglected. He had read little, and knew nothing of magic and these things, but he had heard it was only foolishness. Timmons was an honourable man and wouldn't lie. He had said the plan of getting rid of the gold was to be that Leigh was to pretend to make it and sell it openly or with very little secrecy. That was a good notion if Leigh could persuade people he made it. Unfortunately gold could not be run into sovereigns. It had to be stamped cold and that could only be managed by machinery.
Well, anyway, if this man, this Leigh, knew a lot of hidden things he might know a lot about chloroform and laudanum and other drugs he heard much about but that did not come in his way of business. Leigh might know of or have invented something more sudden and powerful than chloroform and have asked Timmons to smell a bottle, or have waved a handkerchief in Timmons's face, and Timmons might have there and then gone off into a sleep and dreamed all he believed about the walk at midnight and the church clock.
That looked a perfectly reasonable and complete explanation. In fact it was the explanation and no other was needed. This was simplicity itself.
But what was the object of this hocussing of Timmons, and, having hocussed the man, why didn't he rob him of the gold he had with him, or call the police? That was a question of nicer difficulty and would require more beer and a pipe. So far he was getting on famously, doing a splendid morning's work.
He made himself comfortable with his tobacco and beer and resumed where he had left off.