“‘Why,’ said she, ‘to-morrow it’ll be shut!’ and then I didn’t really know what to say, and I agreed to drawing up an advertisement then and there, so as not to lose an instant’s time after I had been at the Milk Street office on Tuesday and found the picture had not been turned in.  She said I could dictate the advertisement and she would write it down, and she asked:  ’Which one of his Sorrento things was it?  You must describe it exactly, you know.’  That made me feel awfully, and I said I was not going to have my next-to-last Sunday evening with her spoiled by writing advertisements; and I got away, somehow, with all sorts of comforting reassurances from her.  I could see that she was feigning them to encourage me.

“The next morning, I simply could not keep away from the Milk Street office, and my unreasonable impatience was rewarded by finding it at least ajar, if not open.  There was the nicest kind of a young fellow there, and he said he was not officially present; but what could he do for me?  Then I told him the whole story, with details I had not thought of before; and he was just as enthusiastic about my getting my picture as the Westchester Park station-master or the head man of the stables.  It was morally certain to be turned in, the first thing in the morning; but he would take a description of it, and send out inquiries to all the conductors and drivers and car-cleaners, and make a special thing of it.  He entered into the spirit of the affair, and I felt that I had such a friend in him that I confided a little more and hinted at the double interest I had in the picture.  I didn’t pretend that it was one of Blakey’s Sorrento things, but I gave him a full and true description of it, with its length, breadth, and thickness, in exact measure.”

Here Minver’s brother stopped and lost himself in contemplation of the sketch, as he held it at arm’s-length.

“Well, did you get your picture?” I prompted, after a moment.

“Oh yes,” he said, with a quick turn towards me.  “This is it.  A District Messenger brought it round the first thing Tuesday morning.  He brought it,” Minver’s brother added, with a certain effectiveness, “from the florist’s, where I had stopped to get those Mayflowers.  I had left it there.”

“You’ve told it very well, this time, Joe,” Minver said.  “But Acton here is waiting for the psychology.  Poor old Wanhope ought to be here,” he added to me.  He looked about for a match to light his pipe, and his brother jerked his head in the direction of the chimney.

“Box on the mantel.  Yes,” he sighed, “that was really something very curious.  You see, I had invented the whole history of the case from the time I got into the Back Bay car with my flowers.  Absolutely nothing had happened of all I had remembered till I got out of the car.  I did not put the picture beside me at the end of the car; I did not keep my hand on it while I talked with General Filbert; I did not leave it behind me when