19000 Pound Part 36

"Yes, sir."

"I want you to come along with me now, and make me a cash offer for the houseful of furniture, just as it stands. If your offer is good enough I shall accept it, on condition that you clear the whole lot out before to-night."

"To-night!"

"Yes, to-night. There are only nine rooms--a couple of vans would move it all easily. However, if you don't think you can manage it, I'll try somewhere----"

"Not at all, sir," said the man, taking off his ap.r.o.n, and rolling down his s.h.i.+rt-sleeves; "I'll be ready in two seconds."

He scented a profitable job. Hasty matters of this kind often come in the way of furniture dealers and brokers--generally with much profit to the buyer.

The buyers are wont to sing gladsomely of such transactions.

Surrounding creditors usually sang in another key.

The shopman put on his coat and hat, and went with Loide to The Elms.

Loide let himself in with his key. His servants had been dismissed long since. His meals he had obtained in the city, visiting his home purely for sleeping purposes.

A bargain was struck. The dealer guaranteed that before six o'clock the house should be absolutely clear of furniture--that within an hour the two vans should drive up and clear out all.

They did. The furniture dealer was as good as his word.

Everything was cleared save three feather beds which Loide kept back.

The furniture dealer marveled at this, but he had done well over the deal, and said nothing.

Loide placed those feather beds to his own credit--as an act of mercy.

They were to save the detective pain.

The furniture removers had completed their task and driven away. At their heels trod Loide--in the direction of the post-office.

From there he sent a telegram to his late clerk's address. He thanked his memory that he had remembered the address in the letter applying for the situation.

The telegram ran:

Leaving England to-night, strange and most important information to give you in exchange for your kindness to-day. Come at once, trains every few minutes from Waterloo.

LOIDE, _The Elms, Maypole Road, Wimbledon_.

He paid the one and eightpence cost of the telegram, and then sought in the high road an ironmonger's.

There he bought two saws, a hammer, chisel, some nails, and some yards of webbing.

At a lamp shop he purchased a pound of candles, a ready trimmed bicycle lamp, and then hurried home with his purchases to The Elms.

Entering, he threw off his coat, and tucked up his s.h.i.+rt-sleeves.

Manual labor was not in his way, but he guessed from having seen workmen prepare for their tasks in that way that it was the correct thing to work coatless--he had some hard work ahead of him.

His bicycle lamp lighted, he set to work, drove four of his long French nails through the floor of the pa.s.sage.

The four nails formed a square--a square yard.

With his bicycle lamp in hand, he went downstairs to the wine cellar. A stout old door yielded to the key.

Loide in his palmy days had been a lover of wine, and the cellar had been built to his order. It was the most lofty apartment in the house.

Air and light came to it through strong iron bars, which were on a level with the ground above. The roof was at least fourteen feet from the floor.

On to that roof, formed--apart from the cobwebs--of the rafters supporting the floor boards above, Loide threw the rays of his lantern.

Four bright, sharp points were sticking through the wood, dust, and cobwebs. He grunted with satisfaction as he noted the situation of the points of his nails.

He hurried out of the cellar, up the steps to where the heads of the nails were, and there his real hard work began.

He bored a hole with the aid of the chisel and hammer, then inserting the fret saw, worked through the width of one of the boards, working against the pa.s.sage wall.

This operation he repeated the other side, and in a few minutes had a length of floor board up--a yard long.

With the larger saw he had bought, he was soon sawing through five other boards and their supports, and there presently gaped an opening more than a yard square.

He hurriedly put the boards together again as he had taken them up.

Going into a back room, he ripped some laths from the Venetian blinds.

These he nailed to the floor boards, fastening them together as a lid for the hole he had made.

He tried it--it fitted well. But for his holding it, the lid would have fallen through the hole.

He cut the parcel of webbing open, and, leaning over the hole, nailed pieces along one side of the square beneath the floor boards.

When he had nailed the other ends of these pieces to his lid, he had a crude but perfectly hinged flap.

Rus.h.i.+ng up-stairs, he dragged down two of the feather beds, one after the other, and dropped them through the hole.

That was what he counted as his mercy. He did not want to break any of the detective's limbs.

He just wanted information about the nineteen thousand pounds.

Two pieces of lath slightly tacked under the opposite side of the hole to prevent the lid falling through till trodden on, and he lowered the flap on its hinges.

Apart from the sawdust around, it looked a perfect floor. He swished away the dust, and stood up with a smile of satisfaction on his face.

He was dog tired with the work, but he had done all he needed to do. The snare was set--the trap was waiting.

Would the bird come to his call?