before me, so it
seemed foolish to be uneasy. So I waited longer still, but now it was so
late, I thought they should have come out to lunch before this, and then
I was fery uneasy--fery uneasy inteet. So I thought I would pretend to
be a new caller, and I opened the outer office door and banged it, and
walked in very loud and knocked on the boy's table. I thought Denson
would come when he heard that, but no--there was not a sound. So I got
more uneasy, and I opened the window and leaned out as far as I could,
to look in at the other window. There I could see nothing but the big
hat and the back of a chair and a bit of the room--empty. So I went and
banged the outer door again, and called out, 'Hi! Mr. Denson, you're
wanted! Hi! d'y'ear?' and knocked with my umbrella on the inner door;
and, Mr. Hewitt--you might have knocked me down with half a feather when
I got no answer at all--not a sound! I opened the door, Mr. Hewitt, and
there was nobody there--nobody! There was my leather case on the table,
open--and empty! Fifteen t'ousant pounds in tiamonts, Mr. Hewitt--it
ruins me!"

Hewitt rose, and flung wide the inner office door. "This is certainly
the only door," he said, "and that is the only window--quite well in
view from where you sat. There is the wideawake hat still hanging
there--see, it is quite new; obviously brought for you to look at, it
would seem. The door and the window were not used, and the chimney is
impossible--register grate. But there was one other way--there."

The inner wall of each of the rooms was the wall of the corridor into
which all the offices opened, and this corridor was lighted--and the
offices partly ventilated--by a sort of hinged casement or fanlight
close up by the ceiling, oblong, and extending the most of the length of
each room. Plainly an active man, not too stout, might mount a
chair-back, and climb very quietly through the opening. "That's the only
way," said Hewitt, pointing.

"Yes," answered Samuel, nodding and rubbing his knuckles together
nervously. "I saw it--saw it when it was too late. But who'd have
thought o' such a thing beforehand? And the American--either there
wasn't an American at all, or he got out the same way. But, anyway, here
I am, and the tiamonts are gone, and there is nothing here but the
furniture--not worth twenty pound!"

"Well," Hewitt said, "so far, I think I understand, though I may have
questions to ask presently. But go on."

"Go on? But there