"Not the clock. Just the skeleton. Heaven alone knows why she wants it" Jenny bit her lip, "or why anybody wants it. It all started very seriously. Grandmother had gone to visit Aunt Cicely, and got back home about a quarter to eight"
"Yes. I remember."
"I was a bit uneasy when she got home. I shouldn't have been, and I won't be again. But I wondered what she'd say when she found I hadn't gone to visit Mr. and Mrs. Ives after all. She just looked at me in the oddest way—" Jenny hesitated—"as though it didn't matter. She said: 'Jennifer dear, I must think hard for five minutes.'
"Whenever she says that I know it means she's thinking about legal proceedings. Grandmother's got a passion for law suits. She's always trying to prove something from old documents of 1662, or things like that. I imagined she was thinking about the fair (you'll hear about it) that opens on Monday.
"Anyway, she came back in fifteen minutes looking grim and sort of triumphant. She made me sit down in a chair. She said: 'Jennifer, mark my words! The unspeakable Merrivale!’
(Martin could hear Lady Brayle saying it.) '—the unspeakable Merrivale,' Grandmother said, "in the presence of no less than four witnesses, distinctly promised to give me the clock if I answered "a few" questions. These questions I did answer, as the witnesses can testify.'"
To Martin's memory returned a view of the library at Fleet House, with H.M. and Lady Brayle standing on either side of the desk like offenders in a magistrate's court He saw Ruth Stannard, Ricky and himself with their backs to the white marble mantelpiece.
"Jenny,’' he said, "that's true. He did say so!"
"Anyway, I'm afraid I couldn't follow the legal lecture she gave me. Something about possession of the clock including possession of its contents: as, par example, and to wit, when it is sold at Willaby's with a skeleton inside. Then she called for Dawson to get out the electric car. Do you know what an electric car is?"
Martin reflected.