A couple of days passed, and although the newspapermen still pestered Labar, and other potential sources of information at Scotland Yard, the space allotted to the hue and cry in the news dwindled. Labar was thankful. There are times when an energetic and persevering journalist may stumble on something that will aid the police, but in a case of this kind reporters were an embarrassment. There were no innocuous morsels that one might feed them on, and such facts as Labar had up his sleeve he was anxious to keep to himself. Larry no doubt would be scanning the morning and evening journals with assiduity.
The investigation marked time. Gertstein had been able to throw no light on the forgery, save that a cheque form was missing from his book, and in one or two interviews Labar found him more prickly than at first. He seemed gloomily to revel in giving up hope that any result would be achieved by the matter of fact methods of the police. The strange disappearance of Miss Noelson he put down entirely to the heavy-handed tactlessness of Labar. The latter had not thought it worth while to tell everything.