The first floor was cumbered with bales and wicker skeps, and had double crane doors, through the chink of the back pair of which a vertical glimpse of trees and daylight showed. “It will be necessary to disturb your stock,” Cope observed, still watching the merchant unwinkingly, and the two soldiers began to move the heavy bales from the walls, examining every foot for a possible communication with the adjoining warehouse. They found none. The whole building was no more than a shell, and Moon could not have moved a muscle of his face without Cope observing it. Then all at once Cope took the taper and wax and seal from the soldier and began himself to seal the padlocks of the crane doors. He bent over a padlock, and Moon continued to rail behind him. Then happened a very quick piece of work. Like a flash Cope turned from his sealing, to surprise any change in Moon’s expression. How the merchant had known that he would turn at that moment he could hardly have told, save that not until then had the supervisor ceased to watch him. And though Moon’s brow was moist and beaded with sweat, his lips were twitched into something like a smile. Cope’s hand shook on the seal, but the merchant thought he knew now where they were. He kicked one of the bales. “There’s almost room for a man in one of these,” he said mockingly. “Upstairs,” ordered Cope curtly, and they passed up the dark, dusty staircase to the garret. In the garret where Monjoy had worked, the heavy two-legged table lay a-tilt just within the door, and his hearth, the grimy bricks of which lay scattered over the floor, had been newly dismantled. Save for one empty box, all else--tests, crucibles, bellows, Monjoy himself--had gone. Overhead the structure of the rafters showed, and only single boards divided the garret from the chamber beneath. Cope stood for a minute blinking at the lately-disturbed bricks of the little refining-furnace; then he looked rather sheepishly at Matthew Moon. “My compliments, Mr. Moon,” he said, with evident chagrin. “That was very creditably well done. Long ago I had some opinion of your ability. Now, I do not see--no, I do not see--how this could have been improved. Hn! hn! In the street I didn’t doubt of finding here what I wanted. I began to doubt a little down below ... yes, I make you my compliments on having gained perhaps half an hour. Nay,” he seemed suddenly not altogether to disrelish his own discomfiture, “‘twas excellent, and you find favour for it. Ah, well! Seal these doors also, men, and downstairs again quickly.” The two sets of crane doors were quickly sealed, and they passed down the narrow staircase again. Before they had reached the basement Monjoy was in the garret.