Campion shook his head.
‘I don’t know,’ he said, ‘unless it was the Chart of the Buried Treasure, don’t you know.’
Abbershaw got up from his chair and paced slowly up and down the room.
‘There’s only one weak spot in your story, Campion,’ he said suddenly. ‘It sounds like Gospel apart from that. But there is one thing I don’t understand. It’s this: Why didn’t you have a revolver on you when you came out into the garage?’
‘Answered in one,’ said Mr Campion. ‘Because I hadn’t one: I never carry guns.’
‘Do you mean to say that you set out on an infernally dangerous game like this without one?’ Abbershaw’s voice was incredulous.
Mr Campion became momentarily grave.
‘It’s a fact,’ he said simply. ‘I’m afraid of them. Horrible things – guns. Always feel they might go off in a fit of temper and I should be left with the body. And no bag to put it in either. Then poor little Albert would be in the soup.’ He shuddered slightly.
‘Let’s talk about something else,’ he said. ‘I can keep up my pecker in the face of anything else but a corpse.’
Prenderby and Abbershaw exchanged glances, and Abbershaw turned to where the young man with the tow-coloured hair and the unintelligent smile sat beaming at them through his glasses.