“Your satchel? Who could have put them there!”
“I myself. This is the only explanation I can think of. It must have been the thief—John, supposedly—who was rushing to catch the train. Perhaps he saw the gleam of the head-light up the road from one of the upper windows. He may have bundled on his wraps, thrust the box into his overcoat pocket or somewhere and started out to sprint for the train.
“When he struck my manly form the shock that heeled me over must have knocked this box out of his pocket or wherever it was, and I gathered it in with the things spilled out of my bag in the snow.”
“I think you have found the solution Dick. Your injured eye is not a very large price for sixteen thousand dollars worth of gems,” was the comment of Wes.
“Wonderful! wonderful!” exclaimed Mr. Grantham. “I must go at once and tell your mother. She is quite prostrated at this loss.” He started off, but Dick stopped him by calling:
“Father! What reward did I hear you say you had offered for the finding of these shiners?”
“Ha! ha!” laughed the banker. “I don’t think you heard me state the figure, Dick. But didn’t you say something about a sloop yacht the other day—eh?”
TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE:
—Obvious print and punctuation errors were corrected.