Cargill seemed taken aback.
“Can't you see its importance?” he demanded. “I found it down on the beach this morning.”
“How was I to know that until you told me?” Sir Clinton asked mildly. “I'm not psychic, as they call it. I just have to be told things plainly. But I shouldn't shout them, Mr. Cargill, if they really are important.”
Cargill dropped his voice at the implied rebuke.
“You remember I was down bathing this morning before breakfast? And you warned me off the premises—wouldn't let me come nearer than the groyne. I sat down on the groyne and watched you for a while; then you went away. I wasn't in a hurry to bathe just then, so I sat for a bit on the groyne, just thinking things over and trying to put two and two together from what I could see of the footmarks on the sands. I suppose I must have sat there for a quarter of an hour or so. When I got up again, I found I'd been kicking up the sand a bit while I was thinking—shuffling about without noticing what I was doing with my feet. And when I looked down—there was this thing shining on the sand at my toes. It was half hidden; and until I picked it up I didn't spot what it was. By that time your party had cleared out. So I made a careful note of the spot, put the thing in my pocket, and set off to look for you. Unfortunately, you weren't to be found just then; so I've been waiting till I could get hold of you.”
He looked at the chief constable eagerly as though expecting some display of emotion as a reward for his trouble; but Sir Clinton's face betrayed nothing as he thanked Cargill.
“Would you mind getting aboard?” he asked immediately. “I'd like to see just where you found this thing.”
Then, as a concession to Cargill's feelings, he added:
“You must have pretty sharp eyes. I thought I'd been over that ground fairly carefully myself.”
“Probably the thing was buried in the sand,” the Australian pointed out. “I saw it only after I kicked about a while.”