“Honestly, Maggie, I had nothing to do with dropping the wash,” he declared so emphatically that she could not but be impressed. “I didn’t even notice that you’d hung it out. And as for breaking the line——”
“Well, somebody broke it!” said Maggie tartly. “Look at it!” And she snatched a coil of rope from a shelf above the tub.
Sam gravely inspected the parted strands.
“Well, it is broken, fast enough,” he began. “That is”—he was peering hard at the end of the line—“that is, it isn’t broken—I was mistaken; this has been cut.”
“What do you mean?”
“Cut with a knife—and a sharp knife, at that. Made a clean gash. No accident there, Maggie!”
The cook took time to make careful examination.
“My stars, Sam Parker, but you’ve got a head on you, after all!” she declared. “Who’d ’a’ thought it! No; I don’t mean the head—it’s the miserable meanness of the job. But who on earth would be so ugly?”
“I don’t know,” said Sam. “Anyway, though, I’m not the fellow.”
“Well, puttin’ it that way, I don’t suppose you are,” Maggie admitted. “But I’d give a pretty penny to be able to figure out who is.”