"How long have you known Professor Wroxton?"
"About ten years," I answered.
"What was he trying to invent?"
"I don't know," I replied.
"And yet you had his confidence in other matters?"
"But what has all this to do with finding out what has become of my friend?" I blurted out. "Perhaps every moment counts."
"A lot." The chief eyed me in a way I did not like. "Solely because your friend has not been seen by his servants for nearly twenty-four hours, merely because you saw what you believe to be his diamond in some kind of a glass compartment in his laboratory, you come here as distraught as a man who has something terrible on his mind. Why?"
"I can't say." I shifted uneasily under that direct stare. "Somehow I feel that something dreadful has happened to my friend."
"We do not go by feelings." The chief got to his feet. "But you have told me enough to warrant action. I want you to guide me and a couple of men to this house. Please wait here until I return." He left the room.
Sitting there awaiting his return, I tried to ponder the matter reasonably. After all, perhaps the chief was right. Merely because the professor had been absent for a few hours and I had seen what I thought to be his diamond in the laboratory, I had worked myself into a perfect fever of anxiety. I almost smiled to myself. In that businesslike office the whole affair did seem absurd. After all the professor did not have to answer to his servants for his actions.