Labar had thrown two men to shadow Larry Hughes, not hopefully, but as a matter of precaution. Others were trying to discover if Larry had been in touch with any of the greater artists in burglary of late. Then, again on general principles, the movements of every crook who was big enough in his profession to be possibly involved had to be checked. Any one of these possessed of sudden funds, anyone absent from his usual haunts, might be a link in the chain that Labar was trying to establish. Nothing could be taken for granted. Even Gertstein himself⁠—this would have annoyed him⁠—was having some of his private habits pried into, and his associates looked up.

The Yard does not despise scientific methods; but here were no bloodstains, no fingerprints, no trivialities from which a high-domed scientist in an easy chair might deduce the name and address of the main culprit. It was a thief taking enterprise in the good old way of the Bow Street runners, differing only by the use of a more complex and more perfect organisation. For a young detective inspector of the Criminal Investigation Department who was under suspicion of slackness it was decidedly not a day for golf.