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myself too," she replied. "Besides, I didn't know who had done it. And it was more or less of a silly practical joke last night. . . . And, of course, I thought the person who had taken it would say so, or at least put it back. But now--it's awful. And I can't keep quiet any longer. I thought I'd tell you three before I told Aunt."
"Well--what is it, Faithful Hound?" asked Michael.
"Why, when the light went out--you know I said, 'Ghosts and goblins and skeleton hands,' or something? Well, I half frightened myself and half pretended, and I clutched somebody's arm. When the light went up I found it was Augustus I was hugging--and let go so quickly that nobody noticed, I suppose."
"That settles it," said Digby. "It wasn't poor Gussie." "Couldn't have been," he added, "unless those two were one and did it together."
"Don't be an ass, Dig," I said, for poor Isobel was really upset about it.
"Oh, never!" said Digby. "Absolutely never!"
"Well--I like our Augustus all the better for not having adduced this bit of evidence himself," said I.
"Bless the dear boy," said Digby, "and I searched all his little pockets. I must find him and forgive him."
"Have you told Claudia this?" asked Michael.
"Yes," replied Isobel. "But she seems to think that I may have been mistaken."
"Which is absurd, of course," she added.
"Well--friend Gussie ought to be much obliged to you, both for hanging on to him in the dark, and for remembering it, Isobel," said Michael.
"Yes," chimed in Digby, "now he can bark and wag his tail and gambol around the feet of Aunt Patricia, while we walk in outer darkness."
"Tell her at once and get it off your conscientious chest, Isobel," said I.
She looked at me long and miserably, almost apologetically I thought, and went out of the room.
"Say, citizens," said Digby as the door closed, "what I want to know is this. Who pinched this here gem we're being bothered about? Officious and offensive fella, I consider--but Gussie now being out of it, it must be one of us three. . . . Excuse my mentioning it then, but me being out of it, it must be one of you two. Now unless you really want the damned thing, I say, 'Put it back.'"
Michael and I once again looked at each other, Michael's face being perfectly expressionless.
"I think of bolting with it, as I told Isobel just now," said Michael.
"John going with his half too?" asked Digby.
"No," replied Michael for me. "I'm taking it all."
"Well, old horse," said Digby, looking at his watch, "could you go soon after lunch? I want to run up to town to see a man about a dog, and Aunt seems to have other views for us--until the matter is cleared up."
"Do my best to oblige," said Michael, as I quietly slipped from the room to carry out the idea which had occurred to me as I crossed the hall.
I went to the brass box. Finger-prints were very faintly discernible on its highly-polished lid and front. Going to the wash-basin in the room opening off the neighbouring corridor, I damped my handkerchief, and rubbed soap, hard, on the wet surface. The hall was still empty when I returned, and I promptly began scouring the lid and front of the box.
It was easier, however, to remove the finger-marks than to remove the signs of their removal. I did not wish it to be obvious that someone had been doing--what I was doing.
Under a heavy curtain, in a recess in the panelling, hung overcoats, caps, mufflers, and such outdoor garments. A silk scarf of Digby's struck me as being just the thing I wanted.
I had restored to the box the brilliance which had been its before I soaped it, and was giving it a final wipe with the silk, when the door from the corridor swung open, Michael entered, and I was caught in the act.
And then I saw that in his hand was a piece of wash-leather and a silver-duster, presumably purloined from the butler's pantry!
"Ah!" he said. "Removing all traces of the crime?"
"All--I hope, Beau," I replied.
"Sound plan too," he observed. "Just going to do it myself," and he passed on.
Having finished my task, I placed the fingers of my right hand on top of the box, my thumb on the front, and left as fair and clear a set of finger-prints as I could contrive.
How could it possibly matter to me if a detective identified them as mine? I hadn't taken the "Blue Water," and nobody could prove that I had.
And why was Michael so anxious that his finger-marks should not be found there as a piece of evidence to be coupled with the fact that I had been seen holding his wrist, above the glass cover, when the lights were turned on?
I went up to my room despairing, and trying to recall what I had read, somewhere, about the method of examining finger-prints. I believe they blow a fine powder on to them and then apply carbon-paper or tissue-paper, and take a photograph of the result.
Anyhow, if Aunt had been wily enough to polish the box, just where we would touch it, so that she could get the finger-prints of the person who opened it, she'd get mine all right and those of nobody else, when the detectives came.
§8.
Aunt Patricia did not appear at lunch, nor did Claudia. The Chaplain was still ill in bed.
As Burdon and a footman always waited at that meal, there was no general conversation on the one subject of interest to us all.
It was a painful meal, to me at any rate, though Digby seemed perfectly happy, and Michael unconcerned. The only reference to the theft was during a brief absence of the servants.
"Did you tell Aunt what you proposed to tell her? What did she say?" asked Michael of Isobel.
"Yes. . . . She said, somewhat cryptically, 'Virtue is its own reward,' and nothing else," replied Isobel.
"Gussie," said Digby, "Isobel has--one cannot say 'bearded' of a lady--let us say faced--Aunt Patricia in her wrath, in order to tell her that you must be absolutely innocent of sin, and quite above or beneath suspicion."
"What do you mean?" snarled Augustus.
"She very kindly went to the lioness's den," continued Digby, "to say that she seized you and hung on to you last night while the lights were out--and that, therefore, you could not possibly have gone to the table and pinched the sapphire, as she was hanging on to your arm. I sincerely apologise to you, Gussie, and hope you'll forgive me."
"My arm?" said Augustus, in deep and genuine surprise, ignoring the apology, and quickly adding, "Oh, yes--er--of course. Thanks, Isobel."
We all looked at him. I had been watching him when he spoke, and to me his surprise was perfectly obvious.
"Then Aunt knows I didn't do it?" he said.
"Yes, Gussie," Isobel assured him, "and I'm awfully sorry I didn't say it, at once, last night."
"Yes--I thought you might have done so," replied our Augustus.
"Isobel is not so keen on exculpating herself too, you see," said I, glaring at the creature. "If she were holding your arm, she could not have gone to the table herself. Proving your innocence proves her own."
"Well--she might have thought of me," he grumbled.
"She has, Gussie," said Michael; "we shall all think of you, I'm sure. . . . Anyhow, we are all sorry we were unkind and suspicious."
"Suspicious! You!" said Augustus. "Huh!"
"Yes--and I'm sorry I searched you, Ghastly," put in Digby. . . . "I'll unsearch you by and by, if you're not careful," he added.
And then David and Burdon came in with the next course.
After lunch, feeling