"I've just made an excellent contract with a dealer representing a new house," he said. "He'll take all next season's crop, at a good price. I hoped your visit would bring us good luck, and this is the best."
"Capital news," said Tom. The German's manner was so frank and cordial that he was almost ashamed of his suspicion. "By the way, I found this to-day: it was stuck between two drawers. Is it any good?"
He handed Reinecke the voucher, folded. The German opened it, and said instantly, with a smile--
"At last! I wondered what had become of it. It is a voucher I lost, and I got the shipping clerk to give me another. You found that on the file all right?"
"Yes."
"You don't know how I worried about that lost voucher. And you found it wedged between the drawers? Extraordinary way things have of disappearing! Well, we don't want it now. But I'm glad you found it."
He tore it across and threw the pieces into the waste-paper basket.
"Now for dinner," Reinecke went on. "I hope your appetite is as good as mine. And how have you put in your time to-day?"
The German's explanation was so natural and reasonable, so ready, his manner so free from embarrassment, that Tom was for the moment quite reassured, and chatted unconstrainedly until bedtime--and Reinecke appeared to take great pleasure in making him talk. But later, in the privacy of his room, some rather troublesome questions suggested themselves. Was it not unlike a shipping clerk to issue a duplicate without writing "duplicate" upon it? How was it that duplicate and original bore consecutive numbers, when at least two or three days must have elapsed between them? It was very odd that no consignment from another firm should have been shipped in the interim. And then suddenly Tom flushed. "By George!" he thought. "I'm hanged if the duplicate hasn't got the earlier number!"
Then he wondered whether he was not mistaken. Saying to himself, "I must find out for certain," he went back to the living-room to examine the fragments in the waste-paper basket. He passed the door of Reinecke's room, and heard his host splashing within.