‘Mr Jobson took it away with him, sir, to get a new one made. The lock is that stiff, he twisted the handle off the key trying to turn it, and he had a job to get it out again.’
Mr Blackford seemed much annoyed. ‘Very careless of him. The lock has always gone well enough before. However, it can’t be helped.—Mind, you don’t come up here to disturb me, do you hear? My letters are important, and I want to be very quiet while I write them.’
‘I’ll take care, sir,’ answered the housekeeper humbly; and the door closed once more.
The old woman set down her candle and put her head out into the street. A sudden desire had come over her to solace her loneliness with the luxury of a bloater for supper. There was a dried-fish shop just round the corner. She could get there and back in a minute, and she would leave the door on the latch, to save herself the trouble of fetching her key. No harm could come to the house in that time; so she set off at a shuffling run along the pavement.
A tall figure came from the shadow of the opposite houses into the middle of the road. It paused and looked up for a moment at the now lighted windows of the solicitor’s office; then it advanced to the door, cautiously pushed it open, and disappeared within.
The housekeeper returned almost immediately. She did not notice that the door was a little wider ajar than she had left it; had she done so, the same high wind which had already extinguished her candle once that evening would have sufficiently accounted for the fact. Taking her light, she vanished into the subterranean region where she lived, whence presently arose the savoury odour of the toasting bloater.
Mr Blackford, on entering his inner room, sat down at his table. He left the door slightly open behind him, in order that he might hear any footstep on the landing, any attempt to enter the outer office. Taking both the wills from his pocket, he spread them before him. Again a wild feeling of exultation surged through his brain and made his pulses bound; he could not resist the pleasure of reading through the document so unavailingly designed to rob him of his hopes, before he put it for ever beyond the power of mischief. After that, he read the will which was in his favour; then he fell once more into a delicious reverie. There was no reason for hurry; he was quite alone and in safety.
He was so absorbed that he did not hear the outer door open with a caution which might well have escaped greater watchfulness. Neither did he hear the catlike step which crossed the floor of the clerks’ office, nor the tiny creak as his own door was pushed open. After this, the silence was deathlike; it was only accentuated by the slight hiss of the burning gas over his head.
Mrs Smith had long finished her bloater, and sat yawning by the dying fire in the nether regions, wondering how long it would be before ‘her gentleman’ took his departure, so that she might lock up and go to bed. Once already she had heard, as she thought, a footstep on the stairs, and the street door quietly closed; so sure had she been of this, that she had gone up to the first floor to see that all was right. But Mr Blackford’s gas was still burning; and through the outer and inner doors, both of which, a little to her surprise, were open, she could see the figure of the solicitor seated in his chair with his back towards her, bending low and intently over his desk; so she had concluded that her old ears had deceived her, and mindful of Mr Blackford’s warning, had stolen back to the basement. That was nearly two hours ago, and her patience was becoming exhausted.
At last she thought that he must either have fallen asleep over his writing, or that he had left without her hearing him; so she once more went up-stairs.