“The ad, Tim!” cried the woman. “Don’t you remember, you couldn’t find the rough draft you made while we were waiting?”
“That’s right, too,” he said. “It was in that vest-pocket. But it didn’t have no name on it.”
“Then, that,” put in the Reverend Peter Prentice, “was the scrawled nonsense—”
“Which you—er—threw into the waste-basket,” drawled Average Jones with a smile.
“Those were not Bailey’s clothes at all?”
“The coat was his; not the waistcoat. His waistcoat may have fallen out of the buggy, or it may be there yet.”
“But what does all this talk of people at work in the dark, and arson, and a mysterious creature tied in a tree lead to?”
“It leads,” said Average Jones, “to a very large rock, much scorched, and with a peculiar carving on it, which now lies imbedded in the earth beneath Tuxall’s barn.”
“If you’ve seen that,” said Farley, “it’s all up.”
“I haven’t seen it. I’ve inferred it. But it’s all up, nevertheless.”