straight stone stairs. Before he reached the latter two men came into view, hurriedly descending, and talking together in muffled undertones—one a gaunt, hungry-looking individual in the garb of a clergyman; the other, burly and bull-necked, dressed in shabby tweeds and bowler hat.
Forsyth stood aside at the stair-foot for them to pass, and then, moved by the furtive glances they turned back at him, he ran upstairs two steps at a time. He knew all his fellow-lodgers by sight; but these men were strangers, and he did not like the looks of the curiously assorted pair. On coming to the door of his rooms, he rapped and spoke the agreed signal, but something prompted him not to wait, and simultaneously he turned the handle. The door swung open at once, without any unbarring from within.
“Where have you got to?” cried Forsyth, peering round the room, in which the gas burned low, just as he had left it.
There was no response; and with a sinking heart he turned on a full light and dashed into the bedroom, only to find that also vacant. The Duke of Beaumanoir had vanished from his refuge.
[85]
