Had he been mistaken? Was Giuseppe’s interest in the parcel just ordinary curiosity? It might be so, but remembering the feverish intensity of the man’s excitement, Anthony decided against that theory. All the same, he was puzzled.
“Dash it all,” said Anthony to himself, “everyone can’t be after the blasted manuscript. Perhaps I’m fancying things.”
Dinner concluded and cleared away, he applied himself to the perusal of the memoirs. Owing to the illegibility of the late Count’s handwriting, the business was a slow one. Anthony’s yawns succeeded one another with suspicious rapidity. At the end of the fourth chapter, he gave it up.
So far, he had found the memoirs insufferably dull, with no hint of scandal of any kind.
He gathered up the letters and the wrapping of the manuscript which were lying in a heap together on the table and locked them up in the suitcase. Then