I have often
wondered at the instinctive wisdom of the precaution;
unconsciously I was acting on what has been one of my guiding
principles ever since. Pains and patience were required: I had
to get my saddle without waking the man, and I was not used to
catching horses in a horse-paddock. Then I distrusted the poor
mare, and I went back to the stables for a hatful of oats, which
I left with her in the clump, hat and all. There was a dog, too,
to reckon with (our very worst enemy, Bunny); but I had been
'cute enough to make immense friends with him during the evening;
and he wagged his tail, not only when I came downstairs, but when
I reappeared at the back-door.
"As the soi-disant new manager, I had been able, in the most
ordinary course, to pump poor Ewbank about anything and
everything connected with the working of the bank, especially in
those twenty last invaluable minutes before turning in. And I
had made a very natural point of asking him where he kept, and
would recommend me to keep, the keys at night. Of course I
thought he would take them with him to his room; but no such
thing; he had a dodge worth two of that. What it was doesn't
much matter, but no outsider would have found those keys in a
month of Sundays.
"I, of course, had them in a few seconds, and in a few more I was
in the strong-room itself.
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