“So,” continued Tess, “I guess we all felt sort of hurt. And Belle Littleweed got so fidgety that she raised her hand. Mr. Marks says: ‘Very well, you give me a number.’
“Belle lisps a little, you know, Aggie, and she said right out: ‘Theventy-theven; thee if you can turn that around!’ He didn’t think we noticed anything, and were stupid; but I guess he knows better now,” added Tess with satisfaction.
“That is all right,” said Agnes with a sigh. “I heartily wish you and Dot had been observant when those women gave you the basket and you had found the bracelet in it before they got away. It is going to make us trouble I am afraid.”
Agnes told the little ones nothing about the strange junkman and his claim. Nor did she mention the affair to any of the remainder of the Corner House family. She only added:
“So don’t you take the bracelet out of the house or let anybody at all have it—if Neale or I are not here.”
“Why, it would not be right to give the bracelet to anybody but the Gypsy ladies, would it?” said Tess.
“Of course not,” agreed Dot. “And they haven’t come after it.”
Agnes did not notice these final comments of the two smaller girls. She had given them instructions, and those instructions were sufficient, she thought, to avert any trouble regarding the mysterious bracelet—whether it was “Queen Alma’s” or not.
The junkman, Costello, certainly had filled Agnes’ mind with most romantic imaginations! If the old silver bracelet was a Gypsy heirloom and had been handed down through the Costello tribe—as the junkman claimed—for three hundred years and more, of course it would not be considered stolen property.
The mystery remained why the Gypsy women had left the bracelet in the basket they had almost forced upon the Kenway children. The explanation of this was quite beyond Agnes, unless it had been done because the Gypsy women feared that this very Costello was about to claim the heirloom, and they considered it safer with Tess and Dot than in their own possession. True, this seemed a far-fetched explanation of the affair; yet what so probable?