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countants this morning."
"What do you expect to find?"
"I'll tell you later," was Tarling's reply. He looked at his watch. "They won't be closed yet, thank heaven!"
The taxi was held up at the juncture of the Embankment and Blackfriars Bridge, and was held up again for a different reason in Queen Victoria Street. Suddenly there was a clang-clang of gongs, and all traffic drew to one side to allow the passage of a flying motor fire-engine. Another and another followed in succession.
"A big fire," said Whiteside. "Or it may be a little one, because they get very panicky in the City, and they'll put in a divisional call for a smoking chimney!"
The cab moved on, and had crossed Cannon Street, when it was again held up by another roaring motor, this time bearing a fire escape.
"Let's get out of the cab; we'll walk," said Tarling.
They jumped out, and Whiteside paid the driver.
"This way," said Tarling. "We'll make a short cut."
Whiteside had stopped to speak to a policeman.
"Where's the fire, constable?" he asked.
"St. Mary Axe, sir," was the policeman's reply. "A big firm of chartered accountants--Dashwood and Solomon. You know them, sir? I'm told the place is blazing from cellar to garret."
Tarling showed his teeth in an unamused grin as the words came to him.
"And all the proof of Milburgh's guilt gone up in smoke, eh?" he said. "I think I know what those books contained--a little clockwork detonator and a few pounds of thermite to burn up all the clues to the Daffodil Murder!"
CHAPTER XXII
THE HEAVY WALLET
All that remained of the once stately, if restricted, premises of Messrs. Dashwood and Solomon was a gaunt-looking front wall, blackened by the fire. Tarling interviewed the Chief of the Fire Brigade.
"It'll be days before we can get inside," said that worthy, "and I very much doubt if there's anything left intact. The whole of the