“Oh yes what?”
“The note. What do we know about it? Not a thing. It’s not a note, it’s a copy of a note. Or is it even that? That might be only what it seems. Maybe the whole business was dreamed up by Hill.”
“The arsenic, froglets, and wallet weren’t dreamed up by Hill,” said Ellery dryly, “not in the light of his current condition and location.
No, Keats, you’re falling for the temptation to be a reasonable man. You’re not dealing with a reasonable thing. It’s a fantasy, and it calls for faith.” He stared ahead. “There’s something that links these four ‘warnings,’ as the composer of the note calls them, links them in a series. They constitute a group.”
“How?” Bits of tobacco flew. “Poisoned food, dead frogs, a seventy-five dollar wallet! And God knows what was in that first box to Priam ― judging by what followed, it might have been a size three Hopalong Cassidy suit, or a bock beer calendar of the year 1897. Mr. Queen, you can’t connect those things. They’re not connectable.” Keats waved his arms, and the car swerved. “The most I can see in this is that each one stands on its own feet. The arsenic? That means: Remember how you tried to poison me? ― this is a little reminder. The frogs? That means... Well, you get the idea.”
But Ellery shook his head. “If there’s one thing in this case I’m sure of, it’s that the warnings have related meanings. And the over-all meaning ties up with Priam’s past and Hill’s past and their enemy’s past. What’s more, Priam knows its significance, and it’s killing him.
“What we’ve got to do, Lieutenant, is crack Priam, or the riddle, before it’s too late.”
“I’d like to crack Priam,” remarked Keats. “On the nut.”
They drove the rest of the way in silence.
Keats phoned just before midnight.