Page:Bedford-Jones--The Mardi Gras Mystery.djvu/156

 "Well, cap'n!" he exclaimed, anxiously, as Gramont drew up. "You're smilin', so I guess it ain't a pinch!"

Gramont laughed gaily. "Those boxes? Nonsense! Say, sergeant, you must have been scared stiff when you saw them!"

"Scared? I was ready to flop, that's all! And how in the name o' goodness did they get in her house? What's behind all this?"

Gramont glanced around. He walked with Hammond to the front of the car, where he could speak without being overheard by the passersby.

"It seems that I was more or less mistaken about Fell being on our trail," he explained, reflectively. "We had a very frank talk about it, and he disclaimed all knowledge of the boxes themselves. I gathered from little things he dropped that some criminal had looted the stuff from the car, and that it came to his attention yesterday in a legal capacity"

"Legal capacity, hell!" snorted Hammond. "Did you swallow all that?"

"My swallowing capacity was pretty good," and Gramont chuckled. "It seems that he opened one of the boxes, and found the note