“Yes, if you do that you’ll be doing well,” said Chief Duncan with a laugh.
“Oh, I’ll do it!” declared the other. “After all, the key mystery doesn’t amount to much. I’ll drop that.”
But there was one present who had made up his mind not to drop the mystery of the brass key, and that individual was Bob Dexter. For here was a mystery just to his liking—no sordid crime was involved, nothing like a sensational murder, such as rumor first had it—only a mysterious robbery, and that of papers which perhaps were of value only to the recent inheritor of them.
“I’ll have a go at it!” Bob Dexter told himself. “But I want to look around when there aren’t so many present. I’m not altogether satisfied that it isn’t possible to get a key in through the walls of this strong room. And I’d like to know why Hiram Beegle built such a strong room. What did he have to guard? What was he afraid of, or, rather, of whom was he afraid? I’d like to find out about these things, and I’m going to.”
He was enlightened on some of these points sooner than he expected.
With the taking away of Hiram by the physician, to the home of Tom Shan, where the old man would be nursed back to health, there was little more that could be done at the lonely log cabin.
“I’ll just lock it up and keep the key,” said Chief Drayton who, in the absence of any relatives of the old man, would seem to have this right under the law. “I’ll keep the brass key, too, though I reckon there isn’t much left in here to steal.”
They were in the strong room at the time, taking a final look around, and the empty chest in the corner bore mute evidence of the futility of keeping guard over the place. Other things of Hiram’s than the brass-bound box might have been taken, but he said nothing about them. His most valuable treasure seemed to be that which Judge Weston had given him the day before, and now that was gone.
“Yes, lock up and we’ll get out,” suggested Chief Duncan. “I’ve got to be getting back to Cliffside. You boys coming with me?” he looked at Ned and Harry.
“We’ll ride back with Bob in his Rolls Royce,” chuckled Harry.