o," said Malcolm Sage, putting a detaining hand upon his arm. "If
you want to demonstrate your agility, try the other. There are marks
on this I want to preserve."

"Right-o," cried Glanedale with a laugh, and a moment later he was
shinning up the further pipe with the agility of a South Sea
islander after coker-nuts.

Malcolm Sage walked towards the pipe, glanced at it, and then at the
footprints beneath.

"You were quite right," he remarked casually. Then a moment later he
enquired:

"Do you usually sit up late?"

"We're not exactly early birds," Glanedale replied a little
irrelevantly. "The Mater plays a lot of bridge, you know," he added.

"And that keeps you out of bed?"

"Yes and no," was the reply. "I can't afford to play with the
Mater's crowd; but I have to hang about until after they've gone.
The governor hates it. You see," he added confidentially, "when a
man's had to make his money, he knows the value of it."

"True," said Malcolm Sage, but from the look in his eyes his
thoughts seemed elsewhere.

"By the way, what time was it that you had a shower here last
night?"

"A shower?" repeated Glanedale. "Oh! yes, I remember, it was just
about twelve o'clock; it only lasted about ten minutes."

"I'll think things over," said Malcolm Sage, and Glanedale, taking
the hint, strolled off towards the house.

Malcolm Sage walked over to where an old man was trimming a hedge.

"Could you lend me a trowel for half an hour?" he enquired.

"No, dang it, I can't," growled the old fellow. "I ain't a-going to
lend no more trowels or anything else."

"Why?" enquired Malcolm Sage.

"There's my best trowel gone out of the tool-house," he grumbled,
"and I ain't a-going to lend no others."

"How did it go?"

"How should I know?" he complained. "Walked out, I suppose, same as
trowels is always doin'."

"When did you miss it?"

"It was there day 'fore yesterday I'll swear, and I ain't a-going to
lend no more."

"Do you think the man who took the jewels stole it?" enquired
Malcolm Sage.

"Dang the jools," he retorted, "I want my trowel," and, grumbling to
himself, the old fellow shuffled off to the other end of the hedge.

Half an hour later Malcolm Sage was in Hyston, interviewing the
inspector of police, who was incoherent with excitement. He learned
that Scotland Yard was sending down a man that afternoon,
furthermore that elaborate enquiries were being made in the
neighbourhood as to any suspicious