ight into the boot-box
from the lobby still stood the tumbler which Arthur himself had
officiously fetched an hour or two ago.

One or two things occurred to Arthur which had not previously struck
him. One was that the door of the boot-box was a very narrow one, and,
closing-to by a spring, it would either have had to be held open or
propped open while Mr Bickers was being hauled in by his captors. He
found that to hold it open wide he would have to get behind it and shut
himself up between it and the stairs. Most likely, all hands being
required for securing the victim, the captors would have taken the
precaution to prop the door open by some means, so as to be ready for
their deep-laid and carefully prepared scheme.

So Arthur groped about and discovered a twisted-up wedge of paper,
which, by its battered look and peculiar shape, had evidently been stuck
at some time under the door to keep it from closing-to. He quietly
pocketed this prize, on the chance of its being useful, and after
possessing himself of the sack and cord, and two wax vestas lying on the
floor, one of which had been lit and the other had not, he prepared to
quit the scene. As he was going up-stairs he caught sight of one other
object--not, however, on the floor, but on the ledge of the cornice
above the door. This was a match-box of the kind usually sold by street
arabs for a halfpenny. Arthur tried to reach it, but could not get at
it even by jumping.

"The fellow who put that there must have been over six feet," said he to
himself.

With some trouble he got a stick and tipped the box off the ledge, and
as he did so it occurred to him that, whereas the dust lay a quarter of
an inch thick on the ledge, and whereas the match-box had no similar
coating of dust, but was almost clean, it must have been put up there
recently. He opened the box and looked inside. It contained wax
vestas, with curiously coloured purple heads, which on examination
corresponded exactly with the matches he had picked up on the floor of
the boot-box.

"Oh," said Arthur to himself, very red in the face, "here's a go!" and
he bolted up to his room.

Dig, as it happened, was out, not altogether to his chum's regret, who
set himself, with somewhat curious agitation, to examine his booty.

First of all he examined once more the match-box, and satisfied himself
that there was no doubt about the identity of its contents with the
stray vestas he had picked up. The r