“You notice, Miller,” he said, “that he seems to have been in the habit of locking and bolting himself in; and that the bolt has been fixed on comparatively recently. That is somewhat significant.”
“It seems to suggests that the swag was hidden here at one time, if it isn’t here now. I suppose we may as well look through these cabinets, just as a matter of form, for he won’t have hidden the stuff in them.”
He produced the dead man’s bunch of keys, and having unlocked the hinged batten which secured the drawers of one, pulled out the top drawer.
“Coins,” he announced; “silver coins. No! By jingo, they’re copper, plated, and no backs to them. Just look at that!”
“Yes,” said Thorndyke, taking the specimen from him, “a silver-faced copper electro, taken, no doubt, from a borrowed coin. Not a bad way of forming a collection. Probably, if he had been skilful enough to join the two faces and make a complete coin, it would have been the original owner who would have had the electrotype, and Wampole would have kept the genuine coin. While you are going through the cabinets, I think I will explore those two cupboards. They seem to me to have possibilities.”
The cupboards in question filled the recesses on either side of the fireplace. Each cupboard was built in two stages—a lower about three feet in height, and an upper extending nearly to the ceiling. Thorndyke began with the right-hand one, throwing open both its pairs of folding doors, after unlocking them with the keys, handed to him by Miller. Then he cleared the shelves of their contents—principally stamp albums and back numbers of The Connoisseur—until the cupboard was completely empty, when he proceeded to a systematic survey of the interior, rapping with his knuckles on every part of the back and sides and testing each shelf by a vigorous pull. Standing on a chair, he inspected the top and ascertained, by feeling it simultaneously from above and below, that it consisted of only a single board.
Having thoroughly explored the upper stage with no result, he next attacked the lower story, rapping at the back, sides, and floor and pulling at the solitary shelf, which was as immovable as the others. Then he tested the ceiling or top by feeling it with one hand while the other was placed on the floor of the upper story.
Meanwhile, Miller, who had been systematically examining the row of home-made cabinets, shut the last of the multitudinous drawers and stood up.
“Well,” he announced, “I’ve been right through the lot, Doctor, and there’s nothing in any of them—nothing, I mean, but trash. This last one is full of buttons—brass buttons, if you’ll believe it. How are you getting on? Had any luck?”
“Nothing definite, so far,” replied Thorndyke, who was, at the moment, taking a measurement of the height of the lower story with a tape-measure; “but there is something here that wants explaining. The internal height of the lower part of this cupboard is two feet ten inches; but the height from the floor of the lower part to the floor of the top part is three feet one inch. So there seems to be a space of three inches, less the thickness of two boards, between the ceiling of the lower part and the floor of the top part. That is not a normal state of affairs.”
“No, by jingo!” exclaimed the superintendent. “Ordinarily, the floor of the top part would be the ceiling of the bottom part. Carpenters don’t waste wood like that. Either the floor or the ceiling is false. Let us see if we can get a move on the floor. That is the most likely, as it would be the lid of the space between the two.”
He passed his hands over the board, feeling for a yielding spot, and craned in, searching for some indication of a joint, as he made heavy pressure on the edges and corners. But the floor showed no sign whatever of a tendency to move. He was about to transfer his attention to the ceiling underneath when Thorndyke stopped him.
“Wait,” said he. “Here is another abnormal feature. This moulding along the front of the door is fastened on with three screws. They have been painted over with the rest of the moulding, but you can make out the slots quite plainly.”
“Well?” queried Miller.
“Carpenters don’t fix mouldings on with screws. They use nails and punch them in with a ‘nail-set’ and stop the holes with putty. Moreover, if you look closely at these screw-heads, you can see that they have been turned at some time since the moulding was painted.”
As the superintendent stooped to verify this observation, Thorndyke produced from his pocket a small leather pouch of portable tools from which he took a screw-bit and the universal handle. Having fitted them together, he inserted the screwdriver into the slot of the middle screw and gave a turn.
“Ah!” said he. “This screw has been greased. Do you see how easily it turns?”
He rotated the tool rapidly, and as the screw emerged he picked it out and exhibited it to Miller.
“Not a trace of rust, you see, although the paint is some years old.”
He laid it down and turned to the left-hand screw, which he extracted with similar ease. As he drew it out of its hole, the moulding became visibly loose, though still supported by the mitre; but when the last screw was extracted, the length of moulding came away in his hand, showing the free front edge of the floor, or bottom-board. This Thorndyke grasped with both hands and gave a steady pull, when the board slid forward easily, revealing a cavity about two inches deep.
“My eye!” exclaimed Miller, as Thorndyke drew the board right out. “This puts the lid on it—or rather takes the lid off.”
He stood for a moment gazing ecstatically into the cavity, and especially at a collection of small, flat boxes that were neatly packed into it; then he grabbed up one of the boxes, and sliding back the hooked catch, raised the lid.
The expression of half-amused astonishment with which he viewed the open box was not entirely unjustified. As the receptacle for a robber’s hoard, it was, to say the least, unconventional. The interior of the box was divided by partitions into a number of little square cells; and in each cell, reposing in a nest of black or white velvet according to its colour, was an unmounted gem.
The superintendent drew a deep breath. “Well,” he exclaimed, “this knocks anything I’ve ever come across. Looks as if he never meant to sell the stuff at all. Just meant to keep it to gloat over. Is this what you had expected to find, Doctor? I believe it is, from what you said.”
“Yes,” Thorndyke replied. “This agrees exactly with my theory of the robbery. I never supposed that he had stolen the gems for the purpose of selling them.”
“Didn’t you?” said Miller. “Now, I wonder why.”
“My dear Miller,” Thorndyke answered, with a smile, “the answer is before you in those cabinets which you have just examined. The man was a human magpie. He had a passion for acquiring and accumulating. He was the born, inveterate collector. Now, your half-baked collector will sell his treasures at a sufficient profit; but the real, thoroughbred collector, when once he has got hold, will never let go.”
“Well,” said Miller, who had been meanwhile lifting out the boxes and verifying their contents with a supercilious glance into each, “what is one man’s meat is another man’s poison. I can’t see myself hoarding up expensive trash like this when I could swap it for good money.”
“Nor I,” said Thorndyke. “We both lack the acquisitive instinct. By the way, Miller, I think you will agree with me that all the circumstances point to Wampole’s having done this single-handed?”
“Undoubtedly,” was the reply. “This is a ‘one-man show,’ if ever there was one.”
“And, consequently, that this ‘find’ puts Osmond definitely out of the picture?”
“Yes,” Miller agreed; “I think there is no denying that.”
“Then you will also agree