"You wish to consult me," suggested the amateur detective wearily. You
might have thought Mr. Nape was so weighed with the secret
investigations and the detection of crime that he regarded any new case
with resentment.
"Ye-es," confessed Hal: he was not overburdened with tact. "You see I
wanted a chap to do something for me, and I didn't want to go to one of
those rotten detective agencies--their charges are so devilishly high."
Mr. Nape dismissed the assumption of his cheapness with a mystical
smile.
"Alicia--that's my cousin ye know--was talking about you the other
night, and it struck me you were the very chap for me."
Half the art of detection lies in preserving a discreet silence at the
right moment and allow the other man to talk: this much Mr. Nape had
learnt.
"Now what I want to know is this: can you find out something about this
Duke fellow--the man at 64? I'm pretty sure he's a rotter, and I'm
absolutely certain that he has documents in his house that would prove,
beyond any doubt, what an out and out rotter he is."
It was a task after the detective's heart: internally he was
ecstatically jubilant; outwardly he was seemingly unaffected. He walked
to his little desk, and with a great display of keys opened a drawer,
taking therefrom a locked book. Again the flourish of keys and the
volume was opened.