Detective and mystery stories, English; Private investigators -- England -- Fiction
"Not always; but usually it is, or course; even if they are not together,
they certainly _have_ been at one time, and to have one is a very long
step toward having the other. Now, to begin with, is anybody suspected?"
"Well, the police are reserved, but I believe the fact is they've nothing
to say. Claridge won't admit that he suspects any one, though he believes
that whoever it was must have watched him yesterday evening through the
back window of his room, and must have seen him put the cameo away in his
desk; because the thief would seem to have gone straight to the place. But
I half fancy that, in his inner mind, he is inclined to suspect one of two
people. You see, a robbery of this sort is different from others. That
cameo would never be stolen, I imagine, with the view of its being
sold--it is much too famous a thing; a man might as well walk about
offering to sell the Tower of London. There are only a very few people who
buy such things, and every one of them knows all about it. No dealer would
touch it; he could never even show it, much less sell it, without being
called to account. So that it really seems more likely that it has been
taken by somebody who wishes to keep it for mere love of the thing--a
collector, in fact--who would then have to keep it secretly at home, and
never let a soul besides himself see it, living in the consciousness that
at his death it must be found and this theft known; unless, indeed, an
ordinary vulgar burglar has taken it without knowing its value."
"That isn't likely," Hewitt replied. "An ordinary burglar, ignorant of its
value, wouldn't have gone straight to the cameo and have taken it in
preference to many other things of more apparent worth, which must be
lying near in such a place as Claridge's."
"True--I suppose he wouldn't. Although the police seem to think that the
breaking in is clearly the work of a regular criminal--from the
jimmy-marks, you know, and so on."
"Well, but what of the two people you think Mr. Claridge suspects?"
"Of course I can't say that he does suspect them--I only fancied from his
tone that it might be possible; he himself insists that he can't, in
justice, suspect anybody. One of these men is Hahn, the traveling agent
who sold him the cameo. This man's character does not appear to be
absolutely irreproachable; no dealer trusts him very far. Of course
Claridge doesn't say what he paid him for the cameo; these dealers are
very reticent about their profits, which I believe are as often something
like five hundred per cent as not. But it seems Hahn bargained to have
something extra, depending on the amount Claridge could sell the carving
for. According to the appointment he should have turned up this morning,
but he hasn't been seen, and nobody seems to know exactly where he is."
"Yes; and the other person?"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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