"I'm sorry," whispered the Watermelon in Billy's ear.
Billy laughed. "We have more cars at home," said she. "It doesn't bother me at all. That's the trouble of being rich, you can't be robbed and feel badly about it."
"Batchelor, you say that you were up until after eleven," said the general, feeling that the occasion called for intelligence. "Did you see Alphonse go out?"
"No," said the Watermelon.
"The landlord says, however, that he must have gone before twelve," went on the general. "Then don't you see how Alphonse could not have stolen the money? Those thefts were not committed until after twelve."
"I don't see how you work that out," said Henrietta, puzzling over it with knit brows.
"Don't you see, Henrietta, that if Alphonse stole our money after twelve, he could not have gone out in the car before eleven, so if he went out in the car before twelve, he did not steal the money. He either stole the money or the car."
"Maybe he didn't take the money," said Henrietta, feeling vaguely and disappointedly that she was not a person with detective-like instincts.
"You see," said the general, "if Alphonse took the car, he did not take the money; if he took the money, he did not take the car."
"He certainly did take the money," snapped the farmer.