“You see the advantages? First of all, the only theft would be one of the replicas, which no one cared much about. Second, the date of the real theft would be left doubtful. And third, this plan gave them any amount of time to dispose of the real things before any suspicions were aroused at all, as regards the genuine Leonardos. My impression is that they had a market for them: some scoundrelly collector who’d pay high to have the Leonardos even if he couldn’t boast publicly that he had them.”
“That’s correct, sir,” the Inspector interposed. “Brackley had a market, but he wouldn’t tell me who the collector was.”
Joan rose from her chair, crossed the room to a small table, and solemnly came back with a tray.
“Have some whisky and soda,” she suggested to Sir Clinton.
“You find the tale rather dry?” he inquired solicitously. “Life’s like that, you know. Inspector Armadale really needs this more than I do. He’s been a long time out in the cold up yonder. I’ll take some later on, if you don’t mind.”
Joan presented the tray to the Inspector, who helped himself.
Sir Clinton waited till he was finished with the siphon and then continued, addressing himself to Joan:
“Perhaps the story has lacked feminine interest up to this point. We’ll hurry on to the day when you, Maurice, and Foss had your talk on the terrace. Down below was Foss’s motor, serving two purposes. It was there if they had to make a bolt, should things go wrong. It also allowed the chauffeur, making a fake repair, to watch what went on in the museum. I gather that he meant to keep an eye on his confederates.
“At that moment, Foss had the three replicas in his pocket; and he was looking for some excuse to carry out the exchange. He led the conversation on to Japanese swords and so forth. I suspect Brackley supplied the basis for that matter, enough to allow Foss to make a show of information. Then Foss brought up the subject of his ‘poor man’s collection’ of rubbings. I’ve no doubt he forced a card there—induced Maurice to offer to let him take rubbings of the medallions. That would be child’s play to an ex-conjurer with a smart tongue. He got his way, anyhow.
“But then came a complication he hadn’t expected. You, Joan, got interested in this taking of rubbings. I admit it was hard lines on the poor fellow. It was the last thing he could have anticipated.”
“Thanks for the compliment!” Joan interjected, ironically.
“Well, it wasn’t in the plan, anyhow,” Sir Clinton went on. “It meant an extra pair of eyes to deceive when the exchange was made; and as the exchange was the crucial move in the whole scheme, your company—strange to say—was not appreciated. In fact, you made Mr. Foss nervous. He wasn’t quite as cool as he could have wished; and my reading of the situation is that he bungled his first attempt at the substitution and had to prolong the agony by pretending to take a second rubbing of the first medallion he got into his hands.
“He had more luck with his second attempt, even with your eagle eyes on him; and he stowed away Medallion Number One in one of the special concealed pockets which he had in his clothes. But he desired intensely to be relieved of your company; and he proceeded to draw your attention to someone calling you. Of course that voice existed solely in his own imagination. But it was quite as effective as a real voice in getting you to leave the museum; and then there was one onlooker the less to bother him in his sleight-of-hand.”
Sir Clinton paused to light a cigarette before continuing. Inspector Armadale, laying down his paper, turned to the Chief Constable as though expecting at this point to hear something which he did not already know.
“The next stage is one of pure conjecture,” Sir Clinton went on. “Foss is dead, and I haven’t had any opportunity of interrogating the other actor: Marden.”
Inspector Armadale smiled grimly at the way in which the Chief Constable evaded any reference to the valet’s murder.
“Possibly Inspector Armadale has a note or two on the matter,” Sir Clinton pursued, “but even if he has, it can only be something like ‘what the soldier said,’ for Brackley could have merely secondhand evidence at the best. Take the case as the Inspector and I found it. Foss was dead, stabbed with the Muramasa sword. On its handle we found the fingerprints of Maurice, and no others. Under Foss’s body we found an undischarged automatic pistol with his fingerprints on the butt. We noticed curious pockets in Foss’s clothes; but they were empty. And we found no trace of any of the medallions about the place. Maurice was non est inventus—we could see no sign of him. Marden had cut his hand in a fall against one of the cases. He’d wrapped it up with his handkerchief in a
