“On that one occasion when the ‘tawny’ man crossed our path, I took from the first a rather more serious view of his scope and intention than you did.  The same day I sent a cipher cable to Pierson of the New York service.  I asked for news of any man of such and such a description—­merely negative—­who was known to have left the States; an educated man, expert in the use of disguises, audacious in his operations, and a specialist in ‘dry’ work among banks and strong-rooms.”

“Why the States, Max?”

“That was a sighting shot on my part.  I argued that he must be an English-speaking man.  The smart and inventive turn of the modern Yank has made him a specialist in ingenious devices, straight or crooked.  Unpickable locks and invincible lock-pickers, burglar-proof safes and safe-specializing burglars, come equally from the States.  So I tried a very simple test.  As we talked that day and the man walked past us, I dropped the words ’New York’—­or, rather, ’Noo Y’rk’—­in his hearing.”

“I know you did.  He neither turned nor stopped.”

“He was that much on his guard; but into his step there came—­though your poor old eyes could not see it, Louis—­the ‘psychological pause,’ an absolute arrest of perhaps a fifth of a second; just as it would have done with you if the word ‘London’ had fallen on your ear in a distant land.  However, the whys and the wherefores don’t matter.  Here is the essential story.

“Eighteen months ago ‘Harry the Actor’ successfully looted the office safe of M’Kenkie, J.F.  Higgs & Co., of Cleveland, Ohio.  He had just married a smart but very facile third-rate vaudeville actress—­English by origin—­and wanted money for the honeymoon.  He got about five hundred pounds, and with that they came to Europe and stayed in London for some months.  That period is marked by the Congreave Square post office burglary, you may remember.  While studying such of the British institutions as most appealed to him, the ‘Actor’s’ attention became fixed on this safe-deposit.  Possibly the implied challenge contained in its telegraphic address grew on him until it became a point of professional honour with him to despoil it; at all events he was presumedly attracted by an undertaking that promised not only glory but very solid profit.  The first part of the plot was, to the most skilful criminal ‘impersonator’ in the States, mere skittles.  Spreading over those months he appeared at ‘The Safe’ in twelve different characters and rented twelve safes of different sizes.  At the same time he made a thorough study of the methods of the place.  As soon as possible he got the keys back again into legitimate use, having made duplicates for his own private ends, of course.  Five he seems to have returned during his first stay; one was received later, with profuse apologies, by registered post; one was returned through a leading Berlin bank.  Six months ago he made a flying visit here, purely to work off two more.  One he kept from first to last, and the remaining couple he got in at the beginning of his second long residence here, three or four months ago.