Footprints Without Feet Supplementary Reader Chapter 3 The Midnight Visitor

Ausable is a secret agent.

Ausable was residing at a small room on the top floor of a gloomy French hotel.

The narrator was a writer. He was disappointed because Ausable did not have any resemblance with the secret agents about who the narrator has read. Being a writer, he expected a thrilling episode. But, he didn't encounter anything like that.

After Fowler reached Ausable's room, Ausable made him sit and closed the door. He turned on the lights. And as the light came on, Fowler had his first authentic thrill of the day. For halfway across the room, a small automatic pistol in his hand, stood a man.

Ausable said so to Fowler because he thought that Fowler was expecting him to be a secret agent, a spy who dealt in espionage and danger. He also thought that Fowler wished to meet him because he imagined mysterious figures in the night, the crack of pistols, drugs in the wine.

Ausable thought that Fowler was bored because he thought that Fowler had spent a dull evening in a French music hall with a sloppy fat man who instead of having secret messages manages to get only a prosaic telephone call making an appointment in his room.

Ausable discerned that Fowler got bored because everything turned out against what he had expected. He told him that he was disillusioned because he indicated that something thrilling was supposed to happen. He told him that soon he would see an important paper for which many people had risked their lives. He assumed that some day that paper might well affect the course of history.

It was another secret agent, Max, who stood with an automatic pistol in the room.

Ausable was surprised to see Max in his room because he thought he was in Berlin. 

Max had a lean physique. He was a little less than tall and his features suggested the craftiness and cunningness of a fox. Apart from the automatic pistol in his hand, nothing else was menacing.

Max had come to take a report from Ausable.

The report had information regarding some new missiles.

When Ausable found Max in his room waiting for the report, Ausable moved to an armchair and sat down heavily. He was displeased because this was the second time that somebody had intruded his room thrugh balcony. He decided that he would complain the management about that balcony. 

Max was surprised to know about that balcony because he didn't come through that balcony. He got to enter into the room with the help of a passkey. He said that if he had known about that balcony, he would have less trouble entering into the room.

Max was surprised to know about that balcony because he didn't come through that balcony. He got to enter into the room with the help of a passkey. He said that if he had known about that balcony, he would have less trouble entering into the room.

Ausable had asked the management to block off the balcony owing to the security issues. His room had been intruded twice last month. But, they didn't do anything. So, he became angry with them.

Fowler was standing close to Ausable. Waving the gun towards Fowler, Max asked him to sit as they were supposed to wait for an hour and half. 

Ausable wished that he knew how he learned about the report.

When there was a sudden knocking at the door, Fowler startled while Ausable just smiled saying that it would be police. He had called the police to ensure extra protection for those papers as they were very important. Max bit his lip nervously. 

Max's face was black with anger because Ausable had called the police to make sure everything was all right. He anticipated that he might be caught.

Max became too angry when he got to know that Ausable had called the police.He backed swiftly towards the window and swung a leg over the sill. He warned Ausable to send the police away and said that he would wait on the balcony. He threatened him that he would shoot and take his chances.

A waiter was knocking at the door with a tray, a bottle and two glasses. He had come to serve the drink that they ordered when they had returned. He left the room after he had set the table.

Max left the room thinking that the police had come. But, the waiter was knocking at the door. No, Max couldn't turn up after the waiter left because there was no balcony where he could hide. It must have been Ausable's trick to befool him.

Fowler was a writer who had come to meet Ausable. He expected that he would encounter a romantic adventure. His first authentic thrill of the day came when he saw a man in Ausable's room pointing a pistol towards Ausable and himself.

Max has got into the room through a passkey.

Horace Danby was a fifty years old man. He was unmarried and he lived with a housekeeper. He made locks to make a living and he had two helpers. 

Everyone thought that Horace Danby was a good and an honest citizen.

Horacy Danby suffered with attacks of hay fever in summer.

 Horace had served his first and only sentence in a prison library fifteen years ago.

No, Horace Danby wasn't completely honest . He robbed a safe every year to keep his books. He loved collecting rare and expensive books. He used to by the books secretly through an agent. 

That year, he had been studying the house at Shotover Grange for two weeks. He had carefully observed its rooms, its electric wiring, its paths and its garden.

He planned to rob that day because the family that lived there was in London.The two servants who were taking care of the Grange had gone to the movies. He had seen them going. 

When Horace noticed that the servants had left, he came out from behind the garden wall.He had carefully packed his tools in a bag on his back.

He found fifteen thousand pounds’ worth of jewels in the Grange safe.

He wanted to buy the rare and interesting books that were coming up for sale in the autumn.

Horace called it by it's real name and showed it love to keep the dog quiet.

The safe was kept in the drawing room behind a rather poor painting.