Читать книгу Hidden Foes; Or, A Fatal Miscalculation онлайн

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The last stroke of the bell scarce had died away to a customary stillness, when a burly policeman, one James Donovan, appeared on one side of the square flanking the hospital grounds, moving along near the iron fence and pausing now and then to gaze across the broad avenue at the opposite dwellings, the most of which were shrouded in darkness.

Presently, approaching a gate in the fence, he muttered to himself:

“I may as well have another look. It’s a hundred to one there has been nothing doing, though, or I would have heard it. This evidently isn’t one of the nights for their devilish doings. Hang it, I’m not sure of it!”

He had stopped short, taking out his electric lamp and flashing the beam of light on the ornamental gate. A padlock had been removed and was lying on the gravel walk within. Nearly at his feet, discovered after a brief search, was a piece of black thread.

“By thunder, I was wrong,” Donovan muttered, gazing around and scowling perplexedly. “Have my ears gone back on me? Has this scurvy trick been turned again? Some one has been through this gate since I tied the thread on it. I’ll darned soon find out.”