angry with
himself for his lack of care and perception. I was not indisposed to
banter him a little.

"The second of your questions might be easily answered," I said. "The
thing has been appropriated because somebody believes, as Mr.
Cazalette evidently does, or did, that there may be a clue in those
scratches, or marks, on the inside of the lid. But as to who it was
that believed this, and managed to secrete the box--that's a far
different matter!"

He was thinking, and presently he nodded his head.

"I can call to mind everybody who sat round that table, where these
things were laid out," he remarked, confidently. "There were two or
three officials, like myself. There was our surgeon and Dr. Lorrimore.
Two or three of the country gentlemen--all magistrates; all well known
to me. And at the foot of the table there were a couple of reporters:
I know them, too, well enough. Now, who, out of that lot, would be
likely to steal--for that's what it comes to--this tobacco-box? A
thing that had scarcely been mentioned--if at all--during the
proceedings!"

"Well, I don't know," I remarked. "But you're forgetting one thing,
inspector. That's--curiosity!"

He looked at me blankly--clearly, he did not understand. Neither, I
saw, did Miss Raven.

"There are some people," I continued, "who have an itching--perhaps a
morbid--desire to collect and possess relics, mementoes of crime and
criminals. I know a man who has a cabinet filled with such
things--very proud of the fact that he owns a flute which once
belonged to Charles Pease; a purse that was found on Frank Muller; a
reputed riding-whip of Dick Turpin's and the like. How do you know
that one or other of the various men who sat round the table you're
talking of hasn't some such mania and appropriated the tobacco-box as
a memento of the Ravensdene Court mania?"

"I don't know," he replied. "But I don't think it likely: I know the
lot of them, more or less, and I think they've all too much sense."

"All the same, the thing's gone," I remarked. "And you'll excuse me
for saying it--you're a bit concerned by its disappearance."

"I am!" he said, frankly. "And I'll tell you why. It's just because no
particular attention was drawn to it at the inquest. So far as I remember
it was barely mentioned--if it was, it was only as one item, an
insignificant one, amongst more important things; the money, the watch and
chain, and so on. But--somebody--somebody there!--considered it of