He heard the ringing at the door. He had a telephone concealed in the wall, and this George had connected with a villa at the back of his garden. He pressed the connection and called, “Spoerri!” “Yes, Doctor.” “The police are about to break in. Make your escape as arranged. Fetch the Countess. Get the new car ready for me. Burn all papers. Send pigeon-post to Schachen. That’s all.” While still speaking, he began hastily to put on the police uniform over his own clothes. Then there was the sound of explosion, and the door was broken open, a chair flying into the air. With one bound Mabuse was in the corridor. When the explosion occurred he was on the first floor, which was shut off from the stairway. Close behind the first of the police who entered through the shattered door came Wenk, a heavy revolver in his hand. He was at once struck by the style of the interior, its beautiful carvings and its costly Persian carpets. He took this in at the very first glance as he hurried by. He pointed in silence to the stairs, and while those behind went up them, he and some others inspected the three doors leading to the basement. All were locked, and in a few minutes they had been burst open. The police rushed through all the rooms; one, trying to turn on the electric light, found that it was cut off. Six policemen had stormed the stairs. The door in the panelled wall of the first floor leading from the stairs was open. The men advanced beyond it into a dark corridor, holding their revolvers cocked, and touching all the objects they encountered in the darkness. Nowhere was there any electric light to be had, and it was some time before they had enough electric torches to suffice them. Then in a moment they had taken possession of all the rooms, and the doors leading to the corridor were shut behind them by the detectives, who removed the keys. Wherever they found the rooms empty, they hacked upon the chests and cupboards. Mabuse heard the sounds, which made his usually silent house as noisy as a factory. When furnishing the house he had had a little secret chamber made near the doorway leading to the first floor. A carpenter belonging to his band of accomplices had done the work. This chamber was so cunningly concealed in the cleverly contrived decoration of the walls as to be invisible from the corridor outside, and on the inner side the existence of a door would never have been suspected. It was here that Mabuse had concealed himself when he heard the explosion that wrecked his front door. In this hiding-place he had a second telephone connecting him with the other villa. While the noise of the men storming the stairs covered his movements, he tried to make use of this connection, but there was no answer from the other end; therefore Spoerri must already have got away.