“Here,” the packer declared. “It was packed here and lay here until the lorry came for it the next day.”
“But if you don’t remember this particular case?” French persisted. “Don’t mind my asking. The matter is important.”
The packer regarded him with what seemed compassion and replied with a tolerant forbearance.
“I know because that’s what’s always done and there weren’t no exception in the case of any machine,” he replied, conclusively.
This seemed to end the matter as far as Puddicoombe was concerned, and French next asked to see the carter who had taken it to the station.
The man, fortunately, was available, and French questioned him minutely. He stated he remembered the occasion in question. On the Tuesday morning he had loaded up the crate, Puddicoombe assisting. It was lifted by a differential and pushed out of the packing-shed on a small overhead runway and lowered on to the lorry. He had driven it to the station, unloading it in the goods-shed, and had obtained the usual signature. He had not allowed it out of his sight all the time it was in his charge and it was quite impossible that its contents could have been tampered with.
“I shall see the station people, of course,” French declared to Mr. Fogden when they returned to the latter’s office, “though I don’t suppose the crate could have been tampered with during the journey. What you have told me has satisfied me as to its stay here except on one point. Could the duplicator have been taken out during the night?”
Mr. Fogden believed it impossible.
“We have a night watchman,” he explained; “quite a reliable old fellow, too. Nothing could have been done without his knowledge.”
“Could I see him?”