"Who is that?" he asked.
"It's Mr. Sagon," replied the woman. "He's the greatest one for
singing them little French songs."
"Ah, I have it," said Ashton-Kirk, after a moment. "He's a Basque, of
course. I couldn't place that accent at first."
A narrow, ladder-like flight of stairs was upon one side. Ashton-Kirk
mounted these and found himself in a smaller loft; a number of
well-kept cockatoos, in cages, set up a harsh screaming at sight of
him. Opening a low door he stepped out upon a tin roof. Mrs. Marx and
Pendleton had followed him, and the former said:
"The police was up here looking. They said Mr. Spatola came through
the trap-door at Hume's place that night and walked along the roofs
and so down to his own room."
"That would he very easily done," answered Ashton-Kirk, as his eye
took in the level stretch of roofs.
After a little more questioning to make sure that the landlady had
missed nothing, they thanked her and left the house. At his door they
saw the man in the cloth cap and overalls. A second and very unwieldy
man, with a flushed, unhealthy looking face, had just stopped to speak
to him.
He supported himself with one hand on the wall.
"Hello!" called the machinist to Ashton-Kirk; and as the two
approached him, he said to the unwieldy man: "I stopped you to tell
you these gents had gone in.
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