13303 '"It's the bell of the room you were working in."
13304 'A cold hand seemed to close round my heart.
13305 Someone, then, was in that room where my precious treaty lay upon the table.
13306 I ran frantically up the stairs and along the passage.
13307 There was no one in the corridor, Mr. Holmes.
13308 There was no one in the room.
13309 All was exactly as I left it, save only that the papers committed to my care had been taken from the desk on which they lay.
13310 The copy was there and the original was gone.'
13311 Holmes sat up in his chair and rubbed his hands.
13312 I could see that the problem was entirely to his heart.
13313 'Pray, what did you do then?' he murmured.
13314 'I recognized in an instant that the thief must have come up the stairs from the side-door.
13315 Of course I must have met him if he had come the other way.'
13316 'You were satisfied that he could not have been concealed in the room all the time, or in the corridor which you have just described as dimly lighted?'