“Who shot first?”

“I did, I’m afraid,” said Jimmy. “You see, the man twisted himself out of my grasp suddenly. I saw him making for the window and I closed my finger down on Leopold and let him have it. He turned in the window and fired at me and⁠—well, I suppose after that I took the count.”

He rubbed his head rather ruefully.

But Sir Stanley Digby was suddenly alert.

“Climbing down the ivy, you said? My God, Lomax, you don’t think they’ve got away with it?”

He rushed from the room. For some curious reason nobody spoke during his absence. In a few minutes Sir Stanley returned. His round, chubby face was white as death.

“My God, Battle,” he said, “they’ve got it. O’Rourke’s fast asleep⁠—drugged, I think. I can’t wake him. And the papers have vanished.”