They shook hands solemnly and parted, Ellery to go home to bed and Keats to set the machinery of the Los Angeles police department going on a twenty-four hour a day inquiry into a situation over twenty years old... this time with every prospect of success.
In three days not all the moldy threads were gathered in, but those they had been able to pick up by teletype and long distance phone tied snugly around what they already knew. Ellery and Keats were sitting about at the Hollywood Division trying to guess the lengths and textures of the missing ends when Keats’s phone rang. He answered it to hear a tense voice.
“Lieutenant Keats, is Ellery Queen there?”
“It’s Laurel Hill for you.”
Ellery took the phone. “I’ve been neglecting you, Laurel. What’s up?” Laurel said with a rather hysterical giggle, “I’ve committed a crime.”
“Serious?”
“What’s the rap for lifting what doesn’t belong to you?”
Ellery said sharply, “Something for Priam again?”
He heard a scuffle, then Crowe Macgowan’s voice saying hastily, “Queen, she didn’t swipe it. I did.”
“He did not!” yelled Laurel. “I don’t care, Mac! I’m sick and tired of hanging around not knowing―”