“How many times have I told you to leave my desk alone?” I demanded.
Larry scratched his head. “Sure, times and thin times,” he answered. “But faith, I haven’t so much as laid a finger on it.”
“Don’t talk nonsense. I left these papers under that folded map of New York. Now the papers are all mixed up and the paper-weight is on them. I found the map over here—and, by golly, you’ve even unfolded it and folded it up again the wrong way. What do you mean by it?”
Larry’s butler manner dropped from him now like a garment. “Faith, thin, sor, I haven’t so much as touched the desk, that I haven’t!” he declared earnestly. “Maybe you forgot, like, the way you left things.”
I shook my head and stood staring at him a moment. “Are you sure?” I demanded.
“Sure and sartin, sor. I haven’t touched it.”
“Well then, Larry, somebody else has!” I told him. “I thought you said nothing had happened. Who’s been here, anyway?”
“Not a soul, sor,” he answered quickly.
“Have you been here all the time yourself?” I demanded.
“Ivery minute, sor, except for a walk round yesterday afternoon and a trip to the corner last night, to lay in a bit of bread and meat like.”