Beggar’s Choice

Mr. Carthew came down too. He opened the case, and the case was empty.

The library seemed to fill with silence. It was like water rushing into an empty place.

Mr. Carthew and Cori

A

Cori

“It’s gone!”

And then, to her own surprise, her legs began to tremble so much that she looked round for a chair and sat down abruptly.

“What’s it mean?” said Mr. Carthew in an odd, troubled voice.

Then, with sudden passion, “What’s it mean? A

As if his voice, speaking her name in that sharp peremptory way, had called her from the wings where like many another actress she had been standing dumb with stage-fright, A

It was she who rummaged in the safe, handing things down to Cori

When the safe had been cleared, he roused himself and displayed a sudden energy. Everything was to be put back, the safe re-locked, the picture hung, the blinds drawn up.

When the sun was slanting in again, he slipped the case into his pocket. He looked older. His sudden energy had failed. He leaned with one hand on the table.

“What are you going to do?” said Cori

“Do?” said Mr. Carthew. “Do? The thing’s an heirloom. It’s got to be found.” He straightened himself up as if his own loud voice had encouraged him. “What do we have police for? If we have got a Socialist government, we haven’t got to the point where a burglar can break into my safe and take a family heirloom and get away with it-no, by jingo, we haven’t, though that’s where we’re heading for! Thank God, I shan’t be here to see it! Law and order’ll last my time, and an heirloom’s an heirloom. It don’t belong to me-it belongs to all the Carthews-it belongs-” His voice had been dropping; now it ceased.

Cori

“You can’t call in the police,” she said in a hard, dogmatic tone.

Mr. Carthew stiffened at once.

“I can’t-what? And why not?”

Cori

“It will make such a talk.”-A

“And why the deuce should I care about that?”-Cousin John, the very image of the old squire who is just going to turn an erring daughter out into the snow.

“But, Uncle John, you can’t!”

“And why can’t I? And whose business is it except my own?”

“You mustn’t!”

“Mustn’t I-what?”-and a snort of wrath and the click of the telephone.

Cori

XXXII

Miss Willy Tarrant lived in a dumpy brick house exactly half-way down the village street. The original small casements of the two front rooms having been replaced by generous bow windows Miss Willy commanded a view of practically every front door in Linwood. She knew at once when Dr. Monk had been sent for to a case, or when the Vicar, to whom time meant nothing, was going to be late for church. She could follow him from a few feet within his own hall door all the way to the vestry, and if the vestry door had been left open, she would have been able to watch him robing. This from the dining-room.

The drawing-room afforded her a perfect view of the interior of the local grocery, a partial one of old Mrs. Hoylake’s parlor, and, if she leaned out, an opportunity of seeing Linwood buy its Saturday joints from Mr. Brown the butcher.

Very little went on in Linwood about which Miss Willy did not know at least as much as the people immediately concerned. Sometimes it might be said that she knew a good deal more. She could certainly tell the Vicar just what was wrong with his sermons, and how to improve them; whilst she never met Dr. Monk without contending for the superior efficacy of some specific of her own. She had a finger in every pie, and a better way of baking it than the one which you had always thought quite good enough.

On the morning after Mr. Carthew’s wedding-day a

Miss Willy was so busy for once in a way that she did not observe the approach of Mrs. Hoylake’s son Bert with the post. She heard the rat-tat too late to get to the door and detain him for news of his wife’s sister Ellen, who had married a cousin of Mr. Carthew’s second gardener and had just had twins. Miss Willy had the greatest possible contempt for Ellen’s mother’s views on the upbringing of babies, and she wanted to tell Bert Hoylake so, and to urge him on no account to allow his mother-in-law to give Ellen any advice about the twins. She might have caught him if Rollo, the raven, had not been immediately in front of the door. Rollo required careful handling and had to be coaxed away, by which time the only sign of Bert was the small parcel which he had pushed into the letter-box.

Miss Willy picked the parcel up and went back into the dining-room, where she was greeted by loud squawks of welcome from Archibald, who was climbing methodically up the left-hand curtain, and from the macaw, who was perched on the back of one of the dining-room chairs. She looked round anxiously for the rat, Augustus, because he was not very good at getting out of the way, and, if trodden on, was apt to retaliate. His teeth were still quite good.

When she had located him under the table, she opened the parcel. It was small, about five inches by two, and it excited her curiosity very much. She had cut the string and was unfolding the brown paper, when the front door knocker fell twice with a sharp, clear rap.

Miss Willy looked out of the window, which commanded almost as good view of her own front door as of her neighbor’s, and to her great delight saw A