if you do I'll come back. Understand?"

"Oh, perfectly," she answered. "May I ask one question? Do you
feel very proud of yourself just now?"

He did not answer, but went out of the room quickly, and he had an
impression that she smiled as she watched him go, and that her smile
was bitter and a little contemptuous.

"What a girl," he muttered. "She scored every time. I didn't find
out a thing, she didn't do anything I expected or wanted her to.
She seemed as if she spotted me right off--I wonder if she did? I
wonder if she could be trusted?"

But then he thought of that photograph on the mantelpiece and his look
grew stern and hard again. He was careful to avoid the room the girl
had indicated as occupied by her mother, but of all the others on that
floor he made a hasty search without discovering anything to interest
him or anything of the least importance or at all unusual.

From the wide landing in the centre of the house a narrow stairway,
hidden away behind an angle of the wall so that one did not notice it
at first, led above to three large attics with steeply-sloping roofs
and evidently designed more for storage purposes than for habitation.

The doors of two of these were open and within was merely a collection
of such lumber as soon accumulates in any house.

The door of the third attic was locked, but by aid of the jemmy he
still carried, he forced it open without difficulty.