"I can smell the soil," Van Sneck cried. "How good it is to smell anything again! And I can just catch a suggestion of the perfume of something familiar. What's that red bloom?"
He pointed to a creeper growing up the wall. David broke off a spray.
"That's a kind of Japanese passion flower," he said. "It has a lovely full-flavoured scent like a mixture of violets and almonds. Smell it."
Van Sneck placed the wet dripping spray to his nose. Just for an instant it conveyed nothing to him. Then he half rose with a triumphant cry.
"Steady there," said Bell. "You mustn't get up, you know. I see you are excited. Has it come back to you again?"
"That's the scent," Van Sneck cried. "The air was full of that as I fell backwards. And Henson stood over me exactly by that cracked tile where Mr. Steel is now. Give me a moment and I shall be able to tell you everything … Oh, yes, the first time I slipped on purpose. I told you I stumbled. But that was a ruse. And as I fell I took the ring from my waistcoat-pocket … Let me have another sniff of that bloom. Yes, I've got it now quite clear."
"You know where the ring is?" David asked, eagerly.
"Well, not quite that. I took it from my pocket and pitched it away from me … I saw it fall on to a pot covered with moss, but I can't say which pot or in which corner. I only know that I threw it over my shoulder, and that it dropped into the thick moss that lies on the top of all the pots. I laughed to myself as it fell, and I rejoiced to see that Henson knew nothing of it."
"And it is still here?" Bell demanded.
Van Sneck nodded solemnly.