He bolted out with this one sentence, and then was silent. Marston and I stared at him aghast.
"Is there no mistake?" said Marston at last.
"None," replied Ralph. "I put them in a drawer in the great inlaid writing-table in the library last night, before everybody. I went for them this morning, half an hour ago, at father's request. The lock was broken, and they were gone."
There was another long silence.
"I was a fool, of course, to put them there," resumed Ralph. "Charles told me so; but I thought they were as safe there as anywhere, if no one knew—and no one did except the house party."
"Were any of the servants about?" asked Marston.
"Not one. They had all gone to bed except one of the footmen, who was putting out the lamps in the supper-room, miles away."
Another silence.
"That is the dreadful part of it," burst out Ralph. "They must have been taken by some one staying in the house—some one who saw me put them there. The first thing I did was to send for the house-maids, and they assured me that they had found every shutter shut, and every door locked, this morning, as usual. Any one with time and wits might have got in through one of the library windows by taking out a pane and forcing the shutter. I suppose a practised hand might have done such a thing; but I went outside and there was not a footstep in the snow anywhere near the library windows, or, for that matter, anywhere near the house at all, except at the side and front doors, which are impracticable for any one to force an entrance by."
"When did it leave off snowing?" asked Marston.