“Not quite the same thing,” said the detective. “The face value of these stocks amounts to a little over a million dollars.”
“That’s nonsense,” said Delia Priam with a flare of asperity. “These shares are worthless.”
“Right, Mrs. Priam. I wasn’t sure everybody knew. They’re worth far less than the paper they’re printed on. Every company that issued these shares is defunct.”
“What’s known on the stock market,” said Roger Priam with every evidence of enjoyment, “as cats and dogs.”
“My first husband sank almost everything he had in these pieces of paper,” said Delia in a monotone. “He had a genius for investing in what he called ‘good things’ that always turned out the reverse. I didn’t know about it until after Harvey died. I don’t know why I’ve hung on to them.”
“Why, to show ‘em to your loving second husband, Delia,” said Roger Priam, “right after we were married; remember? And remember I advised you to wallpaper little Crowe’s little room with them as a reminder of his father? I gave them back to you and I haven’t seen them again till just now.”
“They’ve been somewhere in the house, I tell you! Where anyone could have found them!”
“And where someone did,” said Ellery. “What do you make of it, Mr. Priam? It’s another of these queer warnings you’ve been getting ― in many ways the queerest. How do you explain it?”
“These cats and dogs?” Priam laughed. “I’ll leave it to you, my friends, to figure it out.”
There was contempt in his voice. He had either convinced himself that the whole fantastic series of events was meaningless, the work of a lunatic, or he had so mastered his fears of what he knew to be a reality that he was able to dissemble like a veteran actor. Priam had the actor’s zest; and, shut up in a room for so many years, he may well have turned it into a stage, with himself the star performer.