I took it from her and balanced it in my fingers. It was a beautiful piece of workmanship with the simplest carvings on the ivory panels.
"He couldn't have seen it anywhere before to-night," observed Alice musingly. "In fact, I hadn't used it at all for a year. It was really by mistake that my maid put it into my trunk when I went to Japan. I didn't want to risk breaking it again, so I've been carrying it in a hand-bag. The last day we were in Tokyo I think I had it in our sitting-room in the hotel, to make sure it wasn't jammed into the trunk again. We had a good many callers--a number of people came in to bid us good-by, but I'm sure Count Montani was not among them, and it would have been impossible for him to see it at any other time."
"Oh, there is nothing disturbing in the count's interest in the thing," said Mrs. Farnsworth with an air of dismissing the matter. "If it were a Jade trinket inscribed with Chinese mysteries, you might imagine that it would be sought by some one--I have heard of such things--but Alice's fan has no such history."
"We weren't very hospitable," said Alice. "I might have asked Count Montani to dine with us to-morrow; and we might even have put him up for the night in this vast house."
"Not with Antoine on the premises!" I exclaimed. "Antoine is convinced that the man is what we call in America a crook. And Antoine takes his responsibilities very seriously."
While I was breakfasting at the garage the next morning Antoine appeared and, waiting until Flynn was out of hearing, handed me a slip of paper.
"That's a New York automobile number," he said. "It was on the tag of that machine the party came in last night. I heard him saying, sir, as how he had motored up from the Elkton Inn at Stamford. Visitors from Stamford would hardly send in to the city for a machine."
I bade him wait while I called the Elkton by telephone. No such person as Giuseppe Montani had spent the night there or had been a guest of the house within the memory of the clerk. Antoine's chest swelled at this confirmation of his suspicions.
"If the man returns, treat him as you did last night--as though he were entitled to the highest consideration."
"He won't come back--not the same way," said Antoine. "He mentioned the Elkton just to throw you off. The next you hear of him will be quite different."