"Thanks for the tip. I see I'm converting you."
"Not at all, old chap. I want a run for my money, that's all."
"Well, I'll do my best. Ta-ta." Carstairs disappeared.
CHAPTER XVII
Carstairs went straight from the works to Dr Jameson's private house. The Doctor was seriously ill and could not be seen, so he went back to his diggings in deep thought. "Better go home and see the guv'nor before I do anything now. Oh, the fearful and wonderful British law," he thought to himself. He saw the landlady and gave notice.
"Have you got another appointment, Mr Carstairs?" she asked.
"No, I've got the sack," he answered.
"Oh!" she said. "Has Mr Darwen—" she stopped; she wanted to know all about it, but did not know how to ask.
"Mr Darwen has sacked me, yes," he said; Carstairs was a most unsatisfactory subject for a woman to tackle, he left so much to the imagination. "I shall leave about three o'clock on Monday afternoon," he explained, as a conclusion to the subject. He produced his drawing board and settled down to do a good afternoon's work on his slowly evolving patent. As he bent low over the board, scrutinizing some fine detail work, his eye caught an extra pin-hole on the edge of the clean white board. He dug the point of his pencil thoughtfully into it. "That's funny," he said to himself. "I don't remember to have done that." He looked around at the three other corners and saw pin-holes in all of them. It was a new board and he had never had a sheet of paper on it of the size indicated by the pin-holes. "Some devil has been taking a tracing of this, our esteemed friend, Darwen, or his agents, no doubt." He leaned back in his chair in deep thought for a time, then he bent forward and set to work vigorously again.