ady having to pay.
However, Triffitt, bearing in mind what job he was on, was not
displeased that the lift had been omitted--it is sometimes an advantage
to be able to hang over the top rail of a staircase and watch people
coming up from below. He stored that fact in his mental reservoirs. And
now that he had got into his rooms, he proceeded to seek for more
facts. First, as to the rooms themselves--he wanted to know all about
them, because he had carefully noticed, while looking at the plan of
that floor in the office downstairs, that Burchill's flat was arranged
exactly like his own. And Triffitt's flat was like this--you entered
through a double door into a good-sized sitting-room, out of which two
other rooms led--one went into a small kitchen and pantry; the other
into the bedroom, at the side of which was a little bathroom. The
windows of the bedroom opened on to a view of the street below; those of
the sitting-room on to a square of garden, on the lawn of which tenants
might disport themselves, more or less sadly, with tennis or croquet in
summer.

Triffitt looked out of his sitting-room windows last of all. He then
perceived with great joy that in front of them was a balcony, and that
this balcony stretched across the entire front of the house. There were,
in fact, balconies to all five floors--the notion being, of course, that
occupants could whenever they pleased sit out there in such sunlight as
struggled between their own roof and the tall buildings opposite. It
immediately occurred to Triffitt that here was an easy way of making a
call upon your next door neighbour; instead of crossing the corridor and
knocking at his door, you had nothing to do but walk along the balcony
and tap at his window. Filled with this thought Triffitt immediately
stepped out on his balcony and inspected the windows of his own and the
next flat. He immediately saw something which filled him with a great
idea. Both windows were fitted with patent ventilators, let into the top
panes. Now, supposing one of these ventilators was fully open, and two
people were talking within the room in even the ordinary tones of
conversation--would it not be possible for an eavesdropper outside to
hear a good deal, if not everything, of what was said? The idea was
worth thinking over, anyway, and Triffitt retired indoors to ruminate
over it and over much else.

For two or three days nothing happened. Twice Triffitt met Burchill on
the stairs--Burchi