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 Have you got any place where I can deposit the box with tolerable confidence of finding it when I want to take it to the Bank of England to-morrow? It’s a just retribution, I guess, to have to make you its custodian after suspecting you of wanting to lift it.”

Beaumanoir, it seemed, was quite equal to the occasion.

“I can guarantee the impregnability of the fire-proof safe in my muniment room,” he replied with alacrity. “If you will come with me, we will lock it up at once.”

Sturdily disregarding the badinage of his wife and Leonie for thinking robbery possible at Prior’s Tarrant, the Senator followed the Duke, and was conducted by him along many corridors to a stone-floored chamber lined with shelves full of dusty archives, and furnished only with a carved oak table and a few worm-eaten chairs. But, what was more to the purpose, a brand-new safe, resplendent in green and gold, the very latest patent of the most eminent manufacturers, occupied an imposing position at the far end. Producing a key, the Duke unlocked the safe, with no result till a touch on a hidden spring caused the heavy steel door to roll slowly outwards. The interior was