He was summoned to luncheon then, but he came through the ordeal that followed with flying colors. Joseph, the detective’s butler, served him in person, and evidently found nothing more suspicious than Mrs. Peters had done. Gordon still had himself well in hand, and, after the brief greetings were over, little was said. “I’ll eat what’s set before me,” Green Eye had decided. “The servants are well trained, and ought to know Carter’s likes and dislikes by this time; therefore I can’t go far wrong in eating what they serve, whether I like it or not. It won’t be easy to deny myself, and to keep on the alert, but I shall have to pay some penalties, I suppose, for aspiring to be the great and exalted Nick Carter.” And he grinned at the thought. After luncheon the impostor hurried back upstairs, and hunted up a box of Nick’s favorite Havana cigars. A handful of them underwent a careful selection, and a more or less appreciative sniffing before being transferred to his pocket. “Not so bad,” he commented mentally. “A little too dry, though, and I’ve smoked better.” Nevertheless, he did not seem averse to smoking these, one after another. “I shall have to go out before long, I suppose,” he decided. “It’s understood that I’ve been called back on important business, and, as it isn’t convenient for my new client to call on me here, I’ll be expected to meet him elsewhere, and to make a noise like action.” That did not deter him, however, from making an immediate descent upon the safe, but he soon found that he would be obliged to defer serious activities in that connection. He had hoped to be able to open the safe by merely putting one ear to the door and listening to the fall of the tumblers in the lock, but five or ten minutes’ effort convinced him that that was out of the question. “It can’t be done with a lock like this,” he concluded, with a muttered imprecation. “It looks to me as if I would have to force my way in if I’m going to get in at all. That will be decidedly risky, at best, but I think I can do it quietly enough, and, after it’s over, I ought to be able to find some means of concealing my handiwork. Not just now, though, thanks. I’ll take something a little easier, first.” And with that he turned his attention to the desk. The top had been cleared of its accumulation of papers before the detective’s departure, and the drawers were all locked, but Green Eye was provided with certain handy little tools. To be sure, it took two or three minutes to open each drawer, but soon the contents of three or four of them lay at his disposal in plain sight, and he determined to examine these papers and books before opening the other drawers. He was engaged in this absorbing occupation, when the lower bell rang and roused him with a start.