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"Yes, but I have received notice to quit," was the retort. "So I hear. The executioner was quick on the heels of the warrant, too. If it had not been for the precautions Winter took last night the newsboys would have been bawling a second Innesmore Mansions tragedy during the past couple of hours." Theydon smiled. "I'm not joking," snapped Furneaux. "In fact, I feel rather bad about it.
"That phase of the problem has yet to be solved," was his noncommittal reply. Winter rejoined them somewhat hurriedly. He looked puzzled and rather irritated. "Furneaux has made an arrest," he said. "A Chinaman, described as Len Shi, is lodged in the cells at Bow Street, on a charge of being concerned in the Innesmore Mansions murder. Furneaux is out, and that is all they know at the Yard.
She seemed to realize intuitively that any gaps in the recital could be filled in later, whereas it was all-important that the detective should be made acquainted as speedily as possible with the developments brought about by the morning's fuller disclosures. As for Winter, he was keenly interested in Furneaux's behavior at the moment of Forbes's departure from Innesmore Mansions.
On the one hand, Theydon had now a remarkably close insight into the peril which threatened Forbes and each member of his family; the girl, on the other, knew well that her father was bound up in some way with the tragedy at No. 17 Innesmore Mansions.
What of the other fellow who was caught near Innesmore Mansions?" "He's a Jap. He knows nothing. He was hired for the job to put any interfering bobby to sleep." The chief inspector angrily bundled some papers into a drawer, and threw away his cigar, which he had allowed to go out.
In reality it influenced and controlled his future in the most vital way, because, once the cab had crossed Oxford Street and turned into the quiet thoroughfare on which the first block of Innesmore Mansions abutted, he passed into a new phase of existence. The cigarette, lighted at last after the altercation, had filled the cab with smoke to such an extent that Theydon lowered a window.
As a matter of fact, I did not leave the Brooklands track until six o'clock, and, as Innesmore Mansions, where I live, lie north, and I was due here at 7:30, I had my man meet me at the station with a suitcase, meaning to change my clothes in the dressing room there, and come straight here.
It behooved him, therefore, to lend a sharp eye to his own safety, and never a vehicle or pedestrian came near while he traversed the quiet streets in the neighborhood of Innesmore Mansions that he did not give the closest attention to cab or wayfarer, as the case might be. As it happened, that quarter of London was singularly deserted.
Now, Theydon had thought hard during the few strides from one flat to the other. His telephone was fixed close to the party wall dividing the two sets of apartments and he was not certain that, in the absolute quietude prevailing in Innesmore Mansions at that late hour, a voice could not be overheard.
Little wonder, therefore, that the driver of the taxi should gaze quizzically after Theydon's alert figure as it vanished in the stairway of Innesmore Mansions. "Got the hump, an' pretty bad," soliloquized the man. "Gimme a bob over the fare, an' all, so can't be stony. But Lord love a duck, you never can tell!"
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