"You've done splendidly, my dear. I'm proud of you. This information you've dug up will be a lot of help in tracing that gang, I'm sure."
Dorothy and her father were seated at the table, taking their morning meal in the breakfast porch, just off the dining room. Although the bond of affection uniting father and daughter was a strong one, especially since the mother's death some years earlier, neither was particularly demonstrative. And Dorothy was not used to receiving unstinted praise of this sort from her father. The colour in her cheeks deepened, and she said off-handedly:
"I'm awfully glad, Daddy. You haven't had your second cup of coffee, have you?"
Mr. Dixon smiled, and passed his cup to her. His shrewd glance took in her evident embarrassment.
"No need to dissemble, daughter. Fact is, I keep forgetting you're no longer a child; and I don't mind telling you how valuable you are to me."
Dorothy smiled back at him. "Thanks a lot, Dad." She returned his filled cup. "Did the gang get away with much?"
"Plenty. A number of easily negotiable bonds, what currency we had on hand, etc. Of course, we're well covered by insurance--but the worst of it is, they took Mrs. Hamberfield's diamond necklace!"
"What! The Hamberfields, of Canoe Hill?"
"The same. They bought the old Adams place two years ago and keep it for a summer residence. More money there than--er--taste, I believe. Mrs. H. goes in for jewels on a big scale."
"Wears diamonds at breakfast, I'll bet, Daddy. She came to the Country Club last Saturday night, dressed up to the hilt and beyond it. I've never seen so much jewelry! Doug Parsons suggested that she'd been robbing Tiffany's. A regular ice-wagon with her diamonds!"