"Anyway, miss, the old doctor with the beard took this skeleton, and put it in a clock after he'd taken the works out, and stuck it up in his back parlour as a kind of… kind of…"
"Memento mori" suggested Martin.
Masters considered this.
"Oh, ah. Just so. If that means what I think it does. Like the people who put up sun-dials with a motto, 'It is later than you think.'"
'It is later than you think.' Yes, Martin had heard that before. When Masters leaned towards Jenny, his head suddenly emerged out of a mist-wreath like a fatherly Spanish Inquisitor.
"Now come, miss!" he urged persuasively. "That's the living truth. And there's no harm in anything; I'll take my oath to it. Why does her ladyship, your good grandmother, want to cause a lot of unnecessary fuss and bother? Just why does she want the thing anyway? Eh?"
"If it comes to that" said Martin, instantly putting a guard between Jenny and Masters, "why do you want it yourself?"
"Ah! I'm afraid that'd be Official Secrets, sir."
"But there was nothing secret about why Lady Brayle wanted it: as a present for Dr. Hugh Laurier. She was bidding for it at Willaby's, until H.M. topped her. Afterwards he gave it to her. That's all."
"Is it, now?" Masters asked affably. "Then why did she take the skeleton alone? And not the clock?"