I want you to take the exact place you occupied when you first learned that something had gone wrong in the opposite gallery." The stranger's distress grew.

With a show of indecision scarcely calculated to inspire confidence in either of the two men watching him, he moved now here and now there till he finally came to a standstill close by the pedestal--so close, indeed, to its inner corner that he was almost in a line with its rear.
"It was here," he declared with a gulp of real feeling.

"I am sure I am right now.

I had just stepped out----" "From behind the tapestry ?" "No." His blank astonishment at the quickness with which he had been caught up left him staring for a moment at the speaker, before he added: "From behind the pedestal.

The--the vase, as you see, is a very curious one.