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Page 15
He measured the distance with his eye. The little table stood
beside a deep divan, and he saw that with care it would be
possible to drop upon this divan without making much noise. He
calculated its exact position before replacing the torch in his
pocket, and then, resting back against one side of the frame, he
clutched the other with his hands. He wriggled gradually down
until further purchase became impossible. He then let himself
drop, and swung for a moment by his hands before releasing his
hold.
He fell, as he had calculated, upon the divan. It creaked
ominously. Catching his foot in the cushions, he stumbled and
lay forward for a moment upon his face, listening intently.
The room was very hot but nothing stirred.
VII
THE SCUFFLING SOUND
Detective Durham, as he lay there inhaling the peculiar perfume
of the place, recognized that he had put himself outside the pale
of official protection, and was become technically a burglar.
He wondered if Chief Inspector Kerry would have approved; but he
had outlined this plan of investigation for himself, and knew
well that, if it were crowned by success, the end would be
regarded as having justified the means. On the other hand, in
the event of detention he must personally bear the consequences
of such irregular behaviour. He knew well, however, that his
celebrated superior had achieved promotion by methods at least as
irregular; and he knew that if he could but obtain evidence to
account for the death of the man Cohen, and of the Chinaman Pi
Lung, who had preceded him by the same mysterious path, the way
of his obtaining it would not be too closely questioned.
He was an ambitious man, and consequently one who took big
chances. Nothing disturbed the silence; he sat upon the divan
and again pressed the button of his torch, shining it all about
the low-beamed apartment and peering curiously into the weird
shadows of the place. He calculated he was now in the position
which Cohen had occupied during the last moments of his life, and
a sense of the uncanny touched him coldly.
As he thought of the unnatural screams spoken of by Poland, some
strange instinct prompted him to curl up his feet upon the divan
again, as though a secret menace crawled upon the floor amid its
many rugs and carpets.
He must now endeavour to reconstruct the plan upon which the
American cracksman had operated. Poland had a persistent belief
that Cohen had known where the fabled hoard of Huang Chow was
concealed.
Durham began a deliberate inspection of the place. He thought it
unlikely that a wily old Chinaman, assuming that he possessed
hidden wealth, would keep it in so accessible a spot as this. It
was far more probable that he had a fireproof safe in the room
upstairs, perhaps built into the wall. Yet, according to
Poland's account, it was in this room and not in any other that
death came to Diamond Fred.
The wall-hangings first engaged Durham's attention. He moved
them aside systematically, one after another, seeking for any
hiding-place, but failing to find one. The door communicating
with the outer office he found to be locked, but he did not
believe for a moment that the office would be worthy of
inspection.
There were cases containing jewelled weapons and cups and goblets
inlaid with precious stones, but none of these seemed to have
been tampered with, and all were locked, as was the big cabinet
filled with snuff bottles.
Many of the larger pieces about the place contained drawers and
cupboards, and these he systematically opened one after another,
without making any discovery of note. Some of the cupboards
contained broken pieces of crockery, and more or less damaged
curios of one kind and another, but none of them gave him the
clue for which he was seeking.
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