Matilda gaped at Mr. Pyecroft. Mrs. De Peyster, half-rising on an elbow, peered in amazed stupefaction at her incalculable young man of the sea.
"Why, of course, she'd have turned it over to some one else for safe-keeping!" the detective cried triumphantly. "Where is it?" he demanded of Mr. Pyecroft.
"I'm not so sure I have it," said the shallow Mr. Pyecroft apologetically. "It just seems to me that I saw writing like this. If I have, it's over in a little room I keep. But if I really do have it"—with the shrewd look of a small mind—"we couldn't sell it for fifteen hundred."
"How much d'you want?"
"Well"—Mr. Pyecroft hesitated—"say—say three thousand."
"Good God, that's plain blackmail!"
"It may be, but poor people like us don't often get a chance like this."
"I won't pay it!"
"Perhaps, then,"—apologetically,—"we'd better deal with Mrs. Allistair direct."