“Where did you leave it?”
“Up here. Right in this room. It was a new satchel too. I’ll have the law on him, that’s what I’ll do.”
“Isn’t that your satchel, Lizzie?” asked Miss Cornelia, indicating a battered bag in a dark corner of shadows above the window.
“Yes’m,” she admitted. But she did not dare approach very close to the recovered bag. It might bite her!
“Put it there on the hamper,” ordered Miss Cornelia.
“I’m scared to touch it!” moaned Lizzie. “It may have a bomb in it!”
She took up the bag between finger and thumb and, holding it with the care she would have bestowed upon a bottle of nitroglycerin, carried it over to the hamper and set it down. Then she backed away from it, ready to leap for the door at a moment’s warning.
Miss Cornelia started for the satchel. Then she remembered. She turned to Bailey.
“You open it,” she said graciously. “If the money’s there—you’re the one who ought to find it.”
Bailey gave her a look of gratitude. Then, smiling at Dale encouragingly, he crossed over to the satchel, Dale at his heels. Miss Cornelia watched him fumble at the catch of the bag—even Lizzie drew closer. For a moment even the Unknown was forgotten.