reover, what with the storm and
the splashing journey up the drain, there had been scanty opportunity
for conversation. Also, when he saw how Inspector Val looked forward to
the capture of Storri in the midst of crime, the strain of expectation
made silence the natural thing. It took Inspector Val's sudden yet
decisive assertion that Storri was dead, to provoke the first word.
Storri's death instantly overshadowed all else in the thoughts of
Richard.

"Storri dead!" he exclaimed, making as though he would enter London
Bill's tunnel, from which Inspector Val had crawled to make his grim
announcement.

"Dead as Nero!" returned Inspector Val. "But not there--not in the
tunnel!"

"Where then?" asked Richard.

"In Grant Place. You recall the San Reve?--she who wrote the letter
about those French shares? Both Storri and she are dead in Grant Place,
or I'm not an Inspector of Police."

Richard was for going to Grant Place, but Inspector Val detained him.

"There's no hurry," he said. "Any discoveries to be made in Grant Place
will wait. On second thought the death of the Russian is the best
solution. But there's no hurry. Besides," continued Inspector Val, his
tones betraying that sublime appreciation of art at its utmost which an
amateur of bronzes might have felt in the presence of Cellini's Perseus,
"besides, I want you to take a look over this job of London Bill! You'll
never again see its equal--never such perfection of plan and execution!"

Richard was glad of the darkness that hid the half-smile which the
delight of Inspector Val called forth. Protest would be of no avail; it
was one of those cases where to yield is the only way of saving time.

Inspector Val re-entered London Bill's tunnel and invited Richard to
follow. He showed Richard how truthfully, like the work of a best
engineer, the tunnel--begun high above water-mark on the side of the
drain--sloped downward until it dipped beneath the Treasury walls. Then
it began to climb, heading as unerringly for the gold as though London
Bill had brought clairvoyant powers to direct his digging. The tunnel
ran to the rear of the vault, and about six feet beneath its floor. Then
it went straight upward; and next, the supporting earth and masonry
having been removed, the gold, pressing with its vast weight, had forced
down two of the floor slabs of steel on one side, precisely as London
Bill designed from the beginning. Those five-thousand-dollar sacks
spilled the