“May I look?” I asked.
He held out the envelope reluctantly.
“There it is,” he said, and pointing with his garden-rough forefinger. “I.A.P.A.M.P. What can you make of that?”
I took the thing in my hands. The adhesive stamp customary in those days was defaced by a circular postmark, which bore the name of the office of departure and the date. The impact in this particular case had been light or made without sufficient ink, and half the letters of the name had left no impression. I could distinguish—
I A P A M P
and very faintly below D.S.O.
I guessed the name in an instant flash of intuition. It was Shaphambury. The very gaps shaped that to my mind. Perhaps in a sort of semi-visibility other letters were there, at least hinting themselves. It was a place somewhere on the east coast, I knew, either in Norfolk or Suffolk.
“Why!” cried I—and stopped.
What was the good of telling him?
Old Stuart had glanced up sharply, I am inclined to think almost fearfully, into my face. “You—you haven’t got it?” he said.