His first step was to seek out Rollo Dangerfield.
“Might I have another look at that peculiar leather thing you showed us one night—the thing your grandfather left?”
Rollo looked at him suspiciously, but complied without any marked reluctance. They went together to the Corinthian’s Room where Rollo opened the safe.
“I’d like to have a glance at the chess-board problem, too,” said Westenhanger, as though struck by an after-thought. “I used to be rather keen on these things, and I’d like to see if I could solve that one.”
The old man put his hand into the safe and withdrew the two objects. Westenhanger took them.
“I’ll copy this, if you don’t mind, and then you can put them back into safety. I’d rather not be responsible for them longer than’s necessary.”
He stepped over into the library, followed by Rollo, and copied down the wording of the document and the position of the chess-pieces under the old man’s supervision. Then he took up the leather disc and inspected it closely.
“I thought, perhaps, that it might have been a leather washer for some mechanical contrivance,” he said at last, handing the shrivelled object back to its owner. “But now that I’ve seen it again, I don’t believe it can have been that, after all. It’s certainly been used for some purpose or other, for the surface isn’t smooth on either side. Shoemaker’s leather sheets always have one side semi-polished, if I’m not mistaken.”
“What made you think of a washer?” inquired Rollo, more from politeness than from interest, it seemed.
“You mentioned that your grandfather took some interest in mechanics—a bit of an inventor, I gathered. So I thought possibly it might have some connection with machinery. But when one looks at it, I doubt if that’s a possible explanation. It might be the washer of a pump-piston, of course, but I shouldn’t think so. The hole in the centre’s only big enough to take the twine. A piston-washer would have a bigger hole in it. No, it beats me.”