'
'Who takes them from the study?'
'I do, sir.'
'Do they appear to have been read very carefully?'
'Well, no, sir; leastways, some of them seem never to have been
opened, or else folded up very carefully again.'
'Did you notice that extracts have been clipped from any of them?'
'No, sir.'
'Does Mr. Summertrees keep a scrapbook?'
'Not that I know of, sir.'
'Oh, the case is perfectly plain,' said I, leaning back in my chair,
and regarding the puzzled Hale with that cherubic expression of
self-satisfaction which I know is so annoying to him.
'_What's_ perfectly plain?' he demanded, more gruffly perhaps than
etiquette would have sanctioned.
'Summertrees is no coiner, nor is he linked with any band of coiners.'
'What is he, then?'
'Ah, that opens another avenue of enquiry. For all I know to the
contrary, he may be the most honest of men. On the surface it would
appear that he is a reasonably industrious tradesman in Tottenham
Court Road, who is anxious that there should be no visible connection
between a plebian employment and so aristocratic a residence as that
in Park Lane.'
At this point Spenser Hale gave expression to one of those rare
flashes of reason which are always an astonishment to his friends.
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