“There!” exclaimed Vail, turning in grim triumph to the chief.
“But,” prattled on the serene old lady, “I’m sorry to say I can’t identify it. Because I don’t see it. I’m perfectly familiar with the Argyle watch. But the Argyle watch is most decidedly not the turnip-like timepiece our friend Quimby is dangling so seductively before me.”
Thaxton groaned aloud and sank into his chair, his mind awhirl. The chief smiled.
“That seems to settle it,” he said, briskly. “Mr. Vail, you must be mistaken. This cannot be the Argyle watch. Two more-than-reputable witnesses have just testified most definitely to that fact.”
“I don’t know what conspiracy you people are in to save me,” mumbled Vail, glowering from the haggard Clive to the smugly smiling old lady. “But you wouldn’t do it if you didn’t think I am guilty. And that hurts like raw vitriol. I—”
“Don’t be absurd!” chided Miss Gregg. “Don’t lose all the little intelligence the Lord saw fit to sprinkle into that fatuous brain of yours. I’ve known you all your life. I know all about you. You’d never receive a Nobel prize for anything except cleanness and squareness and sportsmanship and kindness. But you’re no thief. And every one knows it. So stop trying to be pathetic.”
“But—”
“Besides,” she continued, in the same reproving tone, “nobody but a kleptomaniac ever steals without a practical motive. What motive have you? Why—!”
“Motive?” boomed Joshua Q. Mosely. “Motive, hey? Well, I can’t speak for you people’s losses, but Mrs. M.’s stolen joolry was worth $12,000, at a low appraisal. That seems to be motive enough for a poor dub of a country hotelkeeper to—”
“My good, if loud-mouthed, man,” replied Miss Gregg, “Mr. Vail’s annual income is something in the neighborhood of $200,000, to my certain knowledge. If he wanted such jewelry as was stolen to-night, he could have bought and paid for a three-ton truckload of it. He could even have paid present-day prices for enough gasoline to run the three-ton truck. What object would he have had in sneaking into our rooms and purloining little handfuls of gew-gaws? That is one argument which may appeal even to your mighty intellect. He—”