Such a monkey trick
looks like mere madness, but I suppose he was mad, partly with the
boredom of watching over what he felt was a fraud, though he
couldn't prove it. Then came a chance to prove it, to himself at
least, and he had what he called 'fun' with it. Yes, I think I see a
lot of details now. But it's just the whole thing that knocks me.
How did it all come to be like that?"
Fisher was looking at him with level lids and an immovable manner.
"Every precaution was taken," he said. "The Duke carried the relic
on his own person, and locked it up in the case with his own hands."
March was silent; but Twyford stammered. "I don't understand you.
You give me the creeps. Why don't you speak plainer?"
"If I spoke plainer you would understand me less," said Horne
Fisher.
"All the same I should try," said March, still without lifting his
head.
"Oh, very well," replied Fisher, with a sigh; "the plain truth is,
of course, that it's a bad business. Everybody knows it's a bad
business who knows anything about it. But it's always happening, and
in one way one can hardly blame them. They get stuck on to a foreign
princess that's as stiff as a Dutch doll, and they have their fling.
In this case it was a pretty big fling."
The face of the Rev.
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