Light, streaming from somewhere in the backyard areas, illuminated a wide white bed. "I am sick, Glorious Lutie--I think I am very sick," said Susannah. "Watch me, won't you? Keep Warner out!" Fumbling in the bag, she drew out the miniature, set it up against the mirror on the bureau beside the bed--just where she could see it plainly in the shaft of light. She locked the door. She lay down. IX Lindsay sat in the big living-room beside the refectory table. Mrs. Spash moved about the room dusting; setting its scanty furnishings to rights. On the long table before him was set out a series of tiny villages, some Chinese, some Japanese: little pink or green-edged houses in white porcelain; little thatched-roofed houses in brown adobe; pagodas; bridges; pavilions. Dozens of tiny figures, some on mules, others on foot, and many loaded with burdens walked the streets. A bit of looking-glass, here and there, made ponds. Ducks floated on them, and boats; queer Oriental-looking skiffs, manned by tiny, half-clad sailors; Chinese junks. In neighboring pastures, domestic animals grazed. Roosters, hens, chickens grouped in back areas. "That's just what Miss Murray used to do," Mrs. Spash observed. "She'd play with them toys for hours at a time. And of course Cherry loved them more than anything in the house. That's the reason I stole them and buried them." "How did you manage that exactly?" Lindsay asked. "Oh, that was easy enough," Mrs. Spash confessed cheerfully. "Between Miss Murray's death and the auction, I was here a lot, fixing up. They all trusted me, of course. Those toys was all set out in little villages by the Dew Pond. Nobody knew that they were there. So I just did them up in tissue paper and put them in that big tin box and hid them in the bushes. One night late I came back and buried them. Folks didn't think of them for a long time after the auction. You see, nobody had touched them during Miss Murray's illness. And when they did remember them, they thought they had disappeared during the sale." Mrs. Spash paused a moment. Her face assumed an expression of extreme disapproval. "Other things disappeared during the sale," she accused, lowering her voice. "Who took them?" Lindsay asked. All the caution of the Yankee appeared in Mrs. Spash's voice. "I don't know as I'd like to say, because it isn't a thing anybody can prove. I have my suspicions though." Lindsay did not continue these inquiries. "Where did Miss Murray get all these toys?"