When Philip Esdaile had put into old William Dadley's hands the framing of two of his pictures I think he had done so largely on compassionate grounds. As you have seen, his real reason for having the old man round to Lennox Street that afternoon a few weeks ago had had remarkably little to do with pictures, but quite a lot to do with a bullet that a child had been found popping in and out of his mouth. But having made framing his pretext, I suppose he felt bound to give Dadley a job. I became sure of this when, calling at the dusty little shop at eleven o'clock on the following Monday morning, I saw the pictures themselves. I knew enough about Esdaile's work to see in a moment that there was no urgency whatever, and that probably he had not wanted the pictures framed at all. Certainly he could be in no hurry for them. The autumn, or for that matter the following autumn, would be quite time enough.

This being so, I wondered for a moment that he had troubled me about them, but I did not wonder for very long. A former suspicion was renewed in my mind. It seemed to me to confirm Glenfield's prophecy, that Esdaile, having made as it were impulsive and unconsidered advances to the rest of us, was about to draw in his horns again. Yet at the same time he had the appearance of wishing to be on both sides at once—of keeping his own counsel, but also of endeavoring to "pump" those from whom he was now withdrawing his half-extended confidence. In a word, without expressly asking me to spy out the land for him, he wished me to do so, and trusted to my interest, garrulity or whatnot to report to him anything I might discover.

Well, had I happened to call on old Dadley before that Sunday afternoon I had spent so remarkably in his studio I dare say I should have done as he wished. But that hole in the floor put a very different complexion on matters. He knew about that hole, but he had no suspicion that I now shared his knowledge. Therefore if he proposed to act independently I did not see why I should not do the same. He would make use of me, would he? Very well. It rather amuses us to be made use of when we guess the intention, to allow our legs to be pulled with the knowledge that at our pleasure the position can be reversed. I am very fond of Philip and he of me, but there is no mush about our friendship. We take it keenly and with relish, even to our long rivalry at the billiard-table. Undoubtedly he knew something I didn't know, but on the other hand I thought it likely that I too had now a minor advantage. He could hardly have known of the presence of that ring in that hole. He had been round his house covering up pictures, drawing blinds and removing the key from the cellar door, and would certainly not have left that ring where it was had he known it had been there. It had been put there since he had last seen the hole. The event, as you will see, showed that I was right in this, and that in one of his main objects he had broken down badly. A bon chat bon rat. I laughed softly.

"Done with you, Philip," I murmured. "I'll send you the packet of sketches, and you shall know how your precious picture-framing's going on. But that's all you are going to get for the present."

And so I sought the little shop with the bisected Old Master in the window, one half cleaned up like day and the other dingy as night.

Dadley was not doing anything in particular except sitting among his molding-patterns eating an apple. The door of his workshop beyond stood open, and when I told him my errand he led me into these back premises, leaving the greater part of the apple on the shelf beneath his counter but bringing small portions of it in his gray beard. The pictures were going on very nicely, he said, but he was waiting for glass; I wouldn't believe how difficult it was to get glass; like asking for the moon, it was, trying to buy glass. It was as he talked about the price and scarcity of glass that I drew my own conclusions about those two pictures. Obviously a job given out of kindness. As obviously it followed that I myself was being used to serve a turn.

"A fine painter, Mr. Esdaile, it's a pleasure to work for him," the old man ran on; and I did not reply that in my experience few pleasures in the world lasted quite so long. I was thinking of other things, the nature of which you may guess at.

For I wanted to know, by no means for the purpose of passing the information on to Philip, how Mr. Harry Westbury had fared since I had last seen him, and whether his friendship with Inspector Webster prospered. I also wanted to know the latest news of Monty Rooke. I decided that it was better to begin with Rooke, so did not hesitate to ask Dadley whether he had seen him.

"Oh, yes, he was in here last Thursday—no, Wednesday," the old man replied. "Paspertoos. Six of them, or else eight; no, six; I think the other two are Mr. Hammond's. I can't show you them because they're all glued up in the press. And I can get the glass for small things like that. It's the large plate that breaks my heart."

"Then Mr. Rooke is working again?" I said. "The last time I saw him he told me that his removal had rather interrupted his work."

The lids dropped over the kind old eyes. "Yes, sir, and I understand Mr. Rooke's had trouble as well."

This, if he meant Mrs. Cunningham, I did not propose to discuss, and he went on.

"Well, you get over these things when you're young, but it seems hard at the time. And troubles seem always to come together in a lump. I sympathize with Mr. Rooke, which some doesn't. He's always been a very pleasant gentleman to me."

"Oh? Who doesn't sympathize with Mr. Rooke?" I asked.

He hesitated for a moment. "Oh—there's a few here and there—but it will blow over—it will blow over. I think it's blowing over now as a matter of fact."

It was at this point that I suddenly decided on a measure of candor. He was a likeable old soul, long past even such innocent relish of contest as that I entertained towards Philip, a lover of peace and the least mischievous of gentle gossips.

"Do you mean the affair of that parachute that morning?" I asked him. "I was there, you know."

His ivy-veined old hand smoothed the edge of his mitering-machine.

"Yes. I know you were," he said. "Yes, I know you were. But I think it'll blow over now that Mr. Westbury's taken this turn he has."

"Mr. Westbury? Yes, I remember. What turn has he taken?"

"Well, sir, as a matter of fact, that's what some of us is waiting to hear," he replied.