or both men
had a certain pleasure in dealing with human beings--humanity was the
material they loved to work upon. The detective was too wise to let his
zeal for the wealthy Englishman outrun discretion. He did very little in
the case, and brought back a distinct opinion that Grosse could, at
present, do nothing but mischief by interference. Madame Danterre had
always lived a very retired life, and was either a real invalid or a
valetudinarian. Her great, her enormous accession of wealth had only
been used apparently in the sacred cause of bodily health. She saw at
most six people, including two doctors and her lawyer; and on rare
occasions, some elderly man visiting Florence--a Frenchman maybe, or an
Englishman--would seek her out. She never paid any visits, although she
kept a splendid stable and took long drives almost daily. The detective
was depressed, for he had really been fired by Grosse's view as to the
will, and he had come to so favourable an opinion of Grosse's ability
that he had wished greatly for an interview between the latter and
Madame Danterre to come off.

Edmund was loth to leave Florence until one evening when he despaired,
for the first time, of doing any good. It was the evening on which he
succeeded in seeing Madame Danterre without the knowledge of that lady.
The garden of the villa into which he so much wished to penetrate was
walled about with those amazing masses of brickwork which point to a
date when labour was cheap indeed. Edmund had more than once dawdled
under the deep shadow of these shapeless masses of wall at the hour of
the general siesta.

He felt more alert while most of the world was asleep, and he could
study the defences of Madame Danterre undisturbed. A lost joy of boyhood
was in his heart when he discovered a corner where the brickwork was
partly crumbled away, and partly, evidently, broken by use. It looked as
if a tiny loophole in the wall some fifteen feet from the ground had
been used as an entrance to the forbidden garden by some small human
body. That evening, an hour before sunset, he came back and looked
longingly at the wall. The narrow road was as empty as it had been
earlier in the day. Twice he tried in vain to climb as far as the
loophole, but the third time, with trousers ruined and one hand
bleeding, he succeeded in crawling on to the ledge below the opening so
that he could look inside. He almost laughed aloud at the absurdity of
his own pleasure in doing