-" began Pinto.

"Alone!" snarled the colonel. "I hinted a dozen times, if I hinted once,
that she'd come with a young army of police. The first shout she made
would have been the signal for your arrest and mine. Haven't you had
your lesson to-night? How long do you think it would take Stafford King
to trump up a charge against you and put you where the dogs wouldn't
bite, eh?"

He walked to the window and watched the girl. There was a taxi-cab
waiting at the entrance, and as he had suspected, a man was standing by
the door and followed the girl into the cab before it drove away.

"She timed her visit. I suppose she gave herself five minutes. If she'd
been here any longer, they would have been up for her, make no mistake
about that, Pinto."

The colonel drew down the blinds with a crash and began pacing the room.
He stopped at the farther end and looked at the wall.

"Do you know, I've often wondered why Jack o' Judgment damaged that
wall?" he said. "He's got me guessing, and I've been guessing ever
since."

"You thought it was a freak?" said Pinto, glad to keep his master off
the subject of his Huddersfield blunder.

The colonel shook his head.

"I shouldn't think it was that," he said. "It was not like Jack o'
Judgment to do freakish things. He has an object in everything he does."

"Perhaps it was to get you out of the room for the morning and make a
search for your papers," suggested Pinto.

Again the colonel shook his head.

"He knows me better than that. He knew very well that I would shift
every document from the room and that there was nothing for his
bloodhounds to discover." He thought a moment, pulling at his long,
yellow moustache. "Maybe," he said to himself, "maybe----"

"Maybe what?" asked Pinto.

"The workmen may have been up to some kind of dodge. They might have
been policemen for all I know." He shrugged his shoulders. "Anyway,
that's long ago, and if he'd made a discovery, why, I think we should
have heard about it. Now, Pinto,"--his tone changed--"I'm not going to
talk to you about Crotin. You've made a proper mess of it, and I ought
never to have sent you. We have two matters to settle. Crewe wants to
get out, and I think you're getting ready to bolt."

"Me?" said Pinto with virtuous indignation. "Do you imagine I should
leave you, colonel, if you were in for a bad time?"

"Do I imagine it?" The colonel laughed. "Don't be a fool. Sit down. When
did you see Lollie Marsh last?"