floor, where in any part a board could have been lifted and a receptacle
made for the precious crystals, without counting the articles of
furniture, including the bedding.

"I'm sorry I have no more chairs, gentlemen," said the tenant
banteringly. "Sit on the table, and three of you can make a sofa of the
bed. Never mind tumbling it! You'll do nothing compared to Mr
Superintendent Norton when he begins. I say, though, you should have
given me notice of all this, and then I'd have had a carpenter here to
skin the walls and ceiling so as to have made everything nice and easy
for you. I say, Mr Norton, you'll want a pickaxe and shovel directly,
won't you?"

The directors had paid no heed to the speaker's bantering remarks, but
the superintendent was getting hot, tired, and annoyed by the constant
chatter of the man he was longing to arrest; and, though he had treated
everything so far with calm indifference, his lack of success in his
search for something incriminating in such places as experience had
taught him were in favour with those who carried on diamond-smuggling
began now to tell upon his temper, and he turned sharply upon the
speaker: to snap out words which showed that his thoughts ran on
all-fours with those of Ingleborough.

"Look here, young man!" he said; "I don't know whether you are aware of
it, but you are hard at work building up a black case against yourself,
and if you're not careful you'll find yourself before long working out
your two years as a convict on the Cape Town breakwater."

"I shall!" cried Anson. "What for? Where's your evidence? You've got
a jumped-up cock-and-bull story made by a fellow-clerk who says one
thing while I say another. You've only his word for it. You've found
no diamonds on me, and you've found none in my lodgings."

"Not yet," said the superintendent meaningly.

"Oh, I see! Not yet! Go on, then, pray! I'm not paid by time, so I
can afford to lose a few hours. Search away! Perhaps our clever friend
Ingleborough can tell you where to look. Perhaps he wouldn't like to,
though. It would hurt his feelings to accuse a brother-clerk of being
an illicit trader. But don't mind me, Ingle. It's good sport for you.
Why don't you help, and think you're a good little boy playing at `hot
boiled beans and very good butter' again? Now then, Norton's going
across to the other side. You should call out `colder' when he's going
away from the place, and `warmer' whe