Gibbs was plainly disappointed at this ending to the story.
“If he’s a friend of Mrs. Harrington and young Vaughan, he ain’t no smuggler. He’ll declare the necklace.”
“The Chief has a hunch he won’t,” Duncan said. “He thinks this Denby is some slick confidence guy who has wormed his way into the Harringtons’ confidence so he won’t be suspected.”
Gibbs considered the situation for a moment.
“Maybe he ain’t traveling with the party at all but just picked ’em up on the boat.”
Duncan shook his head. “No, he’s a friend all right. She’s taking him down to the Harrington place at Westbury direct from the dock. One of the stewards on the Mauretania is our agent and he sent us a copy of her wireless to old man Harrington.”
“He sounds to me like a sort of smart-set Raffles,” Gibbs asserted.
“You’ve got it right,” Duncan said approvingly.
“What’s Taylor going to do?” Gibbs asked next.
“He’s kind of up against it,” Duncan returned. “I don’t know what he’ll do yet. If Denby’s on the level and we pinch him and search him and don’t find anything, think of the roar that Michael Harrington—and he’s worth about ninety billion—will put up at Washington because we frisked one of his pals. Why, he’d go down there and kick to his swell friends and we’d all be fired.”