"
"It wasn't any of Jimmy's lot?" the Inspector asked.
Sanford Quest shook his head.
"French," he said, "keep mum, but it was the elderly family retainer,
Macdougal. I felt restless about him. He has lost the girl--he was married
to her, by-the-bye--and the jewels. No fear of his slipping away. I shall
have him here at the time I told you."
"You've a way of your own of doing these things, Mr. Quest," the Inspector
admitted grudgingly.
"Mostly luck," Quest replied. "Take a cigar, and so long, Inspector. They
want me to talk to Chicago on another little piece of business."
* * * * *
It was a few minutes before midnight when Quest parted the curtains of a
room on the ground floor of his house in Georgia Square, and looked out
into the snow-white street. Then he turned around and addressed the figure
lying as though asleep upon the sofa by the fire.
"Lenora," he said, "I am going out. Stay here, if you please, until I
return."
He left the room. For a few moments there was a profound silence. Then a
white face was pressed against the window. There was a crash of glass. A
man, covered with snow, sprang into the apartment. He moved swiftly to the
sofa, and something black and ugly swayed in his hand.
"So you've deceived me, have you?" he panted. "Handed over the jewels,
chucked me, and given me the double cross! Anything to say?"
A piece of coal fell on to the grate. Not a sound came from the sofa.
Macdougal leaned forward, his white face distorted with passion.
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