“Why, they’re almost as heavy as bronze,” he exclaimed.
“The wood of which they are fashioned is a species of teak wood—almost extinct now,” Sir Bertram explained. “Their weight, of course, is rather an argument against their being hollow. On the other hand, they might be hollow and filled with jewels.”
“There is a further legend,” Gregory confided, “that there is inside some sort of infernal machine invented during the last century by the priests, which would go off at any rough usage. That, I must say, seems to me a bit thick. At the same time, the Chinese were always rather great at explosives.”
“I imagine,” Major Holmes said, “that you will not let this superstition stand in your way, provided you are unable to discover the secret opening.”
“As a last resort,” Sir Bertram declared, “we have decided to destroy the less pleasing of the Images.”
“And I,” Gregory announced, in a low tone, his eyes fixed upon the leering Image of the Body, “mean to be the one to strike the blow. One gets kind of superstitious over there, you know, Holmes,” he went on. “I lost possession of the other Image for a time. The robbers got off with it when they raided the train and killed poor old Hammonde, but that unpleasing-looking devil I brought home with me. All I can say is that I don’t want to be left alone with him again for a month or six weeks. You wouldn’t have much chance, would you, at the Norwich Assizes if you pleaded that you had been driven to commit a murder through the influence of an Image? A Chinese judge would have understood it. All I know is that on that boat I was never myself.”
“And here?” Holmes asked curiously.
“I kept out of the way of the thing when it was once here,” Gregory replied. “Uncle Henry took care of it then, and I think it would take more than the power of an Image to move him from the paths of rectitude. Then—through old Endacott, by-the-by—we got hold of the other one. So now I don’t mind. It is only when he’s out of reach of the Soul that that chap’s supposed to do any harm.”
“You were lucky to regain possession of the other Image,” the Chief Constable observed, after a moment’s pause. “Through Mr. Endacott, I think you said?”
“In a sort of way,” Gregory answered coldly.