“I never threw the bracelet down into the cellar. Young Herr Persicke has got something against me…”

What had happened was that Friedrich, having quickly performed his allotted tasks, had then begun looking for the bracelet. Up in the kitchen, Frau Rosenthal had had it in her hand—it was over the bracelet, which she had refused to relinquish, that Friedrich had got into a heated argument with her. Distracted by this argument, he hadn’t paid as close attention as he would normally, and the woman had been able to jump out of the window. So the bracelet must still be lying in the courtyard somewhere.

When Friedrich began looking around, Borkhausen was standing by the wall. Baldur Persicke had caught sight of something flashing and heard a rattle in the coal cellar. He had gone down to look, and lo and behold, there was the bracelet!

“I certainly didn’t throw the bracelet in there!” Borkhausen insisted timidly. “It must have dropped from Frau Rosenthal into the cellar!”

“I see!” said Inspector Rusch. “You’re that sort, are you! That’s the sort of bird who’s working for my colleague. Escherich will be pleased when I enlighten him about the caliber of his occasional associates.”

But all the while the inspector was ruminating, his gaze moved back and forth, back and forth, between Borkhausen and Baldur Persicke. Then Rusch went on, “Well, I’m sure you won’t mind paying us a visit?”

“Not at all, sir!” said Borkhausen, trembling, as his face grew a few degrees paler. “I’m happy to come along! It’s in my interest to have this thing properly cleared up!”

“Very good,” said the inspector drily. And, following a swift look at Persicke, “Friedrich, take the handcuffs off this man. You’ll come with us without them, will you not?”

“Of course I’ll come! Of course, gladly!” Borkhausen eagerly assured him. “I’m not going to run off anywhere. And if I did—well, you’d find me easily enough, Herr Inspector!”

“That’s right!” Rusch said, drily once more. “A bird like you’s never hard to find.” He broke off. “Well, there’s the ambulance, and the police. Let’s see if we can’t get the formalities over with quickly. I’ve got a lot on this morning.”

Later on, once the formalities were indeed “over,” Inspector Rusch and young Persicke once again climbed the stairs to the Rosenthals’ apartment. “Just to make sure the kitchen window’s shut!” as the inspector said.

On the staircase young Persicke suddenly came to a stop. “Did you notice something, Inspector?” he asked in a whisper.

“I noticed various things,” replied Inspector Rusch. “But what did you think about the pencil, my lad?”

“Didn’t you notice how quiet the building is? Did you notice that here in the front building no one leaned out of the window, and in the back building they were everywhere! That’s suspicious, isn’t it? They must have noticed something, the people who live here. They just want to claim not to have noticed anything. Shouldn’t you now search those apartments, Inspector?”

“Well, and where better to start than with the Persickes,” replied the inspector, quietly walking on up the stairs. “Because as I recall none of them were looking out the window, either.”

“They got really blotto yesterday…”

“Listen, Sunshine,” the inspector went on, as though he had heard nothing. “What I do is my affair, and what you do is yours. I don’t want any advice from you. You’re too green for me.” He looked, quietly amused, over his shoulder at the wincing expression of the boy. “Boy,” he said, “if I don’t conduct any house searches here, then it’s purely because they’ve had time to get rid of any evidence.