After dinner that evening I went out on the balcony and sat there, turning it all over in my head, and looking at the woods, black-edged and solid against the night sky. It was very still, not a breath, and presently, off across the garden, I heard the gravel crunch under a foot, a soft padding on the grass, and then a long, lean figure came into the brightness that shot out across the drive from the hall behind me—Ferguson. He dropped down on the top step, settled his back against one of the roof posts, and took out a cigarette case. He was right where the light shone on him, and I could see he had a serious, glum look which made me think he still "had a mad on me" as they say on the east side. That didn’t trouble me; people getting mad when they’ve a reason to never does, and he’d reason enough, poor dear. Puffing out a long shoot of smoke, he said: "I’ve come over to speak to you about that idea of mine—that cigar band I told you about." "Oh," I answered, "you’ve got round to that, have you?" "I have, or perhaps you might say half way around." "Well, I’m the whole way. I’ve spent three days getting there." "I thought you’d beat me to it. What have you arrived at?" "The certainty that the man who dropped the band was the thief." "We’re agreed at last. Have you gone far enough round to come to a suspect?" "No, I’m stuck there." He blew out a ring, watched it float away into the darkness and said: "So am I. But I’ve a small, single compartment brain that can’t accommodate more than one idea at a time. And it’s busy just now in another direction. If you’ll put that forty horse-power one of yours on this we ought to get round the whole way." He glanced sideways at me, his eyes full of meaning. "You’ll find I can be a very grateful person." "Gratitude’s a kind of pay I like." "Yes—it’s stimulating and it can take more than one form." He flung away the cigarette, leaned back against the post and said: "The worst of it is that our main exhibit, the cigar band, is gone. I looked for it last night and found it was lost." "Lost!" I sat up quick. He’d told me where he kept it and right off I thought it was funny. "Gone out of that box you had it in?" "Yes. I wanted to see it when I came in—I’d been in town—and it wasn’t in the box." "Had it been there recently?" "Um—I can’t tell just how recently—perhaps a week ago." "Did you ask about it?" "Yes, I asked Willitts. He said he hadn’t seen it." "Didn’t you tell me you kept studs and jewelry in that box?" "I did; that’s what it’s for. I don’t see how he could have helped seeing it. I daresay he did and, thinking it was of no use, threw it away and then, when he saw I wanted it, got scared and lied." A thing like a zigzag of lightning went through me. It stabbed down from my head to my feet, giving my heart a whack as it passed. My voice sounded queer as I spoke: "He could have known, couldn’t he, of that walk you and Miss Maitland took, that walk when you found the band?"