The small box containing the greyish-blue powder had been replaced in the concealed drawer, and everything had been rearranged in the room, when the local officer said—
“At the end of the corridor there’s another sitting-room.”
“Very well,” Boyd answered. “Let’s see what it’s like,” and we all three, lights in hand, followed our guide until we entered a smaller sitting-room.
An easel stood in it and it was apparently used by Eva as a studio, for she, I knew, took lessons in painting. Upon the easel stood a canvas half finished, while near the window was a small writing-table, the one long drawer of which was locked. The lock was a common one and quickly yielded to Boyd’s skeleton keys, but within we only found another collection of old letters, a quantity of pencil sketches, colours and other odds and ends connected with her art studies. Boyd was turning them over methodically, when suddenly an involuntary exclamation escaped him.
“Ah! What’s this?” he ejaculated, at the same time drawing forth a card about the size of a lady’s visiting card, and held it out to me.
Upon it was drawn in ink a circle. It was executed in exactly the same manner as that we had found concealed beneath the plates in the dining-room at Phillimore Place.
Again he turned the things over and drew out three or four other cards of similar size and style, each bearing a device, one having upon its face the straight line exactly like that we had found in Kensington.
“You recognise these devices?” he inquired.
“Of course,” I responded in an awed voice, utterly bewildered. “What, I wonder, can they denote?”
He shrugged his shoulders, examined each card carefully beneath the rays of his lamp, felt it, and after carefully examining all the heterogeneous collection of things in the drawer, placed them back again, closed it, and relocked it.