“This is it. I wouldn’t trust an express company to deliver it. Suppose we go up to your room and see how the two look side by side.”
They crossed the lobby to the lift.-The cloud was still on Mr. Brewster’s brow as they stepped out and made their way to his suite. Like most men who have risen from poverty to wealth by their own exertions, Mr. Brewster objected to parting with his money unnecessarily, and it was plain that that twenty-three hundred dollars still rankled.
Mr. Brewster unlocked the door and crossed the room. Then, suddenly, he halted, stared, and stared again. He sprang to the bell and pressed it, then stood gurgling wordlessly.
“Anything wrong, old bean?” queried Archie, solicitously.
“Wrong! Wrong! It’s gone!”
“Gone?”
“The figure!”
The floor-waiter had manifested himself silently in answer to the bell, and was standing in the doorway.
“Simmons!” Mr. Brewster turned to him wildly. “Has anyone been in this suite since I went away?”
“No, sir.”