Mr. Jan Steppe sat astride of a chair, his elbows on the back-rest,
his saturnine face clouded with doubt.
"It certainly looks like a very ordinary safe to me, Sault. Do you
mean to say that an expert could not get inside without disturbing
the apparatus, huh?"
"Impossible," replied Sault. "I have filled the top chamber with
water and I have tried at least a thousand combinations and every
time I put the combination wrong, the safe has been flooded."
He twisted the dials on the face of the unpretentious repository,
until he brought five letters, one under the other, in line with an
arrow engraved on the safe door. He was a long time doing this and
Steppe and the Greek watched hm.
"Now!" said Sault.
He turned the handle and the door swung open. The contents were two
or three old newspapers and they were intact.
"What is the code word?" Steppe peered forward. "Huh--why did you
choose that word, Sault?"
"It is one of the very few words I can spell. Besides which, each
letter is different."
"It is not an inappropriate word," said Moropulos amused, "and one
easy to remember. I intend pasting a notice on the safe, Steppe,
explaining frankly that unless the code word is used, and if any
other combination of letters is tried, indeed, if the handle is
turned, whilst the dial is set at any other word than the code word,
the contents of the safe are destroyed. This may act as a deterrent
to promiscuous burglars."
Steppe fingered his stubbly beard. "That will be telling people that
we have something in the safe that we want to keep hidden, huh?" he
said dubiously, "a fool idea!"
"Everybody has something in his safe that he wants to keep hidden,"
said the other coolly.
"Now let me try--shut the door, Sault, that is right." Steppe got
out of the chair to spin the dials. "Now we will suppose that I am
some unauthorized person trying to find a way of opening the safe.
So!"
He turned the handle.
"Open it."
Sault worked at the dials and presently the door swung open. The
newspapers were saturated and an inch of water at the bottom of the
safe splashed out and into a bath-tub that Sault had put ready.
"How about cutting into the safe? Suppose I am a burglar, huh? I
burn out the lock or the side, and don't touch the combination?"
"I have left a hole in one side of the safe," said Sault, and pointed
to a rubber plug that had been rammed into a small aperture.
With a pair of pincers he pulled this out and a stream of water
spurted forth and was mostly caught in the can he held.
"That has the same effect," he explained. "The water is pumped at a
pressure into the hollow walls of the safe. The door is also hollow.
When the water runs out, a float drops and releases the contents of
the upper chamber. In the case of the door, the float operates the
same spring that floods the safe when the handle is turned."
Steppe scratched his head. "Perfect," he said. "You have
experimented with the acid?"
Sault nodded. "Both with sulphuric and hydrochloric," he said. "I
think hydrochloric is the better."
Steppe turned to the Greek. "You had better keep it here," he said,
and then: "Will it be ready today? I want to get those Brakpan
letters out of the way. I needn't tell you, Sault, that the code
word must be known only to us three, huh? I don't mind your
knowing--but, you, Moropulos! You have got to cut out absinthe--d'ye
hear? Cut it out--right out!" His growl became a roar that shook
the room and Moropulos quailed.
"It is cut out," he said sulkily. "I am confining my boozing to the
'Parthenon'. I've got to have some amusement."
"You have it, if all I hear is true," said Steppe grimly. "Give
Sault a hundred, Moropulos. It is worth it. What do you do with
your money, Sault? You don't spend it on fine clothes, huh?"
"He goes about doing good," said Moropulos, with a good-natured
sneer. "I met him in Kensington Gardens the other day, wheeling an
interesting invalid. Who was she, Sault?"
"My landlady's daughter," replied the other shortly.
"No business of yours, anyhow," growled Steppe. "You've met Miss
Merville, huh? Nice lady?"
"Yes, a very nice lady," said Sault steadily. He pushed back his
long gray hair from his forehead.
"Pretty, huh?"
Sault nodded and was glad when his employer had departed.
"Steppe is gone on that girl," said Moropulos. "He'd have brained
you, if you had said she wasn't pretty!"
"He wouldn't have brained me," said Sault quietly.
"I suppose he wouldn't. Even Steppe would have thought twice about
lifting his hand to you. He's a brute though, I saw him smash a man
in the face once for calling him a liar--at a directors' meeting. It
was an hour before the poor devil knew what had happened. Yes, she
is pretty. I see her riding some mornings, a young Diana--delicious.
I'd give a lot to be in Steppe's shoes."
"Why?"
Moropulos rolled a cigarette with extraordinary rapidity and lit it.
"Why? Well, if he wants her, he'll have her. Steppe is that kind.
I don't suppose the doctor would have much to say in the matter. Or
she, either."
Sault picked up an iron bar from the table. It was one of four that
he had brought for the purpose of strengthening the safe, and it was
nearly an inch in diameter.
"I think she would have something to say," he said, weighing the bar
on the palms of his hands.
And then, to the Greek's amazement, he bent the steel into a V. He
used no apparent effort; the bar just changed its shape in his hands
as though it had been made of lead.
"Why did you do that?" he gasped.
"I don't know," said Ambrose Sault, and with a jerk brought the steel
almost straight.
"Phew!"
Moropulos took the bar from his hand.
"I shouldn't like to annoy you seriously," he said. He did not speak
of Beryl again.