“The police! What on earth makes you think that?” I asked. “Police? Come!”
“Didn’t you see Sir Charles Sperrigoe—whoever he may be—in conversation with our local police inspector last night?” she answered. “Obvious! The old person is in consultation with the police. Perhaps—don’t you see?—the box has been stolen.”
“You don’t imply that Mr. Parslewe stole it?” I suggested.
“Well, I have heard that antiquaries are not above appropriating things!” she answered with a laugh. “Their sense of mine and thine, I believe, is somewhat indefinite. But we’ll acquit Jimmie. Only, he may have bought it from somebody who stole it.”
“That’s more like it,” said I. “But in that case, why all this mystery? Why didn’t Pawley—who without doubt came after the box—say what he wanted? Why didn’t Sperrigoe?”
“Oh, Pawley came to see if the box was really here!” she declared. “Sperrigoe came to ask how it got here! That’s plain, to me. But what I want to know is, why such a fuss about it?”
“And what I want to know is, what made Parslewe vanish?” I said. “That’s much more of a mystery.”
“Didn’t you tell me that he seemed to know whom you meant when you described Sperrigoe as Sir Charles?” she asked. “Very well! Sir Charles is somebody whom Jimmie knew years ago. And Jimmie doesn’t want to meet him. Jimmie, as I have told you, is a queer man—an eccentric person. And I don’t think he’ll come home until Sir Charles Sperrigoe has gone away.”
“And I don’t think Sir Charles Sperrigoe will go away until he’s seen Parslewe,” said I. “So there we are!”
“Oh, well! does it matter very much?” she asked. “Aren’t we going out this fine morning? We’re doing no good here, staring at that wretched thing and speculating about it. Let’s be off!”