om door had a Yale lock; there was no forcing
it by foot or shoulder, though Pocket in his passion tried both. So round
he went without a moment's hesitation to the dark-room window by way of
the little conservatory. The blind was drawn. That mattered nothing. He
went back for a plant-pot, and smashed both it and a sheet of ruby glass
with one vicious blow.

Entry was simple after that; he had only to be careful not to cut his
hands or feet. Inside, he removed the broken glass, closed the window, and
let the blind down as he had found it, without looking twice at his
clothes. There they were for him to carry upstairs at his leisure. They
were not his only property in that room either. His revolver was there
somewhere under lock and key. He might want it, waking, if Dr. Baumgartner
came back before his time.

It was easily located; of the lockers, built in with the shelves on the
folding doors, only one was actually locked, and the revolver was not in
the others. Pocket went to his waistcoat for one of those knives beloved
of schoolboys, with the hook for extracting stones from hoofs, among other
superfluous implements. Pocket had never used this one, had often felt
inclined to wrench it off because it was hard to open and in the way of
the other tools. But he used it now with as little hesitation as he had
done the other damage, with almost a lust for breakage; and there was his
revolver, safe and sound as his clothes.

It had been honoured with a place beside a rack of special negatives; at
least, there were other racks, in the other lockers, not locked up like
that; and there was no other treasure that Pocket could see. He had his
hand on his own treasure, was in the act of taking it, trembling a little,
but more elated, as he stood in a ruby flood only partially diluted by the
broken window behind the blind.

At that moment there came such a thunder of knuckles on the door beside
him that the revolver caught in the rack of negatives, and brought the
whole lot crashing about his toes.

ON THE TRACK OF THE TRUTH

The unseen knuckles renewed their assault upon the dark-room door; and
Pocket wavered between its Yale lock, which opened on this side with a
mere twist of the handle, and the broken red window behind the drawn red
blind. Escape that way was easy enough; and if ever one could take the
streets in pyjamas and overcoat, with the rest of one's clothes in a
bundle under one's arm, it was