He turned eastward without looking back. Yet there was something
circumspect in his footfall, something suspicious in the very
casualness of his movements. Trotter leaned out and looked after
him, nonplused by the coincidence, wondering if this second man's
mission was the same as his own. He was almost glad to see
somebody in the same boat.
Then curiosity overcame him. He turned and followed the other
man. He walked eastward, keeping as well in to the house shadows
as he could. He saw the man cross the wider traffic-way that ran
north and south, look quickly up and down the deserted street and
then, as he gained the shadow of the next house wall, veer close
in to an iron paling. Then there was a movement which Trotter
could not quite make out.
It was not until he crossed the street that he saw what the
movement meant. It was not until he caught sight of a galvanized
ash barrel standing beside the basement step and the stranger
ahead of him walking empty-handed away, that Trotter realized the
completeness of the coincidence.
The other man, without so much as stopping for a second, had
quietly dropped his paper-wrapped parcel on the top of the
galvanized barrel.
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