"He would be a useful person, perhaps, in solving the present mystery," said I. "The police seem to have got no further."
"Ah, the Quick business?" remarked Lorrimore. "Um!—well, as regards that, it seems to me that whatever light is thrown on it will have to be thrown from the other angle—from Devonport. From all that I heard and gathered, it's very evident that what is really wanted is a strict examination into the immediate happenings at Noah Quick's inn, and also into the antecedents of Noah and Salter. But is there anything fresh?"
I told him, briefly, all that had happened that afternoon—of the information given by James Beeman and of the disappearance of the tobacco-box.
"That's odd!" he remarked. "Let's see—it was the old gentleman I saw at Ravensdene Court who had some fancy about that box, wasn't it?—Mr. Cazalette. What was his idea, now?"
"Mr. Cazalette," I replied, "saw, or fancied he saw, certain marks or scratches within the lid of the box which he took to have some meaning: they were, he believed, made with design—with some purpose. He thought that by photographing them, and then enlarging his photograph, he would bring out those marks more clearly, and possibly find out what they were really meant for."
"Yes?" said Lorrimore. "Well—what has he discovered?"
"Up to now nobody knows," said Miss Raven. "Mr. Cazalette won't tell us anything."
"That looks as if he had discovered something," observed Lorrimore. "But—old gentlemen are a little queer, and a little vain. Perhaps he's suddenly going to let loose a tremendous theory and wants to perfect it before he speaks. Oh, well!" he added, almost indifferently, "I've known a good many murder mysteries in my time—out in India—and I always found that the really good way of getting at the bottom of them was to go right back!—as far back as possible. If I were the police in charge of these cases, I should put one question down before me and do nothing until I'd exhausted every effort to solve it."
"And that would be—what?" I asked.
"This," said he. "What were the antecedents of Noah and Salter Quick?"