My geography was clear now in one respect. That window belonged to
the same room as the hanging door (B); for I distinctly heard the
latter open and shut again, opposite me on the other side of the
building. It struck me that it might be interesting to see into that
room. 'Play the game,' I reminded myself, and retreated a few yards
back on tiptoe, then turned and sauntered coolly past the window,
puffing my villainous pipe and taking a long deliberate look into the
interior as I passed-- the more deliberate that at the first instant
I realized that nobody inside was disturbing himself about me. As I
had expected (in view of the fog and the time) there was artificial
light within. My mental photograph was as follows: a small room with
varnished deal walls and furnished like an office; in the far
right-hand corner a counting-house desk, Grimm sitting at it on a
high stool, side-face to me, counting money; opposite him in an
awkward attitude a burly fellow in seaman's dress holding a diver's
helmet. In the middle of the room a deal table, and on it something
big and black. Lolling on chairs near it, their backs to me and their
faces turned towards the desk and the diver, two men--von Brüning and
an older man with a bald yellow head (Dollmann's companion on the
steamer, beyond a doubt). On another chair, with its back actually
tilted against the window, Dollmann.

Such were the principal features of the scene; for details I had to
make another inspection. Stooping low, I crept back, quiet as a cat,
till I was beneath the window, and, as I calculated, directly behind
Dollmann's chair. Then with great caution I raised my head. There was
only one pair of eyes in the room that I feared in the least, and
that was Grimm's, who sat in profile to me, farthest away. I
instantly put Dollmann's back between Grimm and me, and then made my
scrutiny. As I made it, I could feel a cold sweat distilling on my