"Do you really mean," he said, "that Colonel Morris took the relic?"
There was a heavy silence, and at last Harold March said, "But where is the real relic?"
"The Duke carried the relic on his own person, and locked it up in the case with his own hands."
I have compared the silver coin to the Koh-i-noor, and in one sense it was even conventionally comparable, since by a historical accident it was at one time almost counted among the Crown jewels, or at least the Crown relics, until one of the royal princes publicly restored it to the shrine to which it was supposed to belong.
But as for saints and relics and things, I fear I'm a bit of a Voltairian; what you would call a skeptic."
"Why, masters," quoth he, "this man is a coquillart, or seller of false relics, and was here in the smithy not two hours ago.
They hurled their relics after him, and so rode back to the blacksmith's the poorer both in pocket and in faith.
"Of putting his head out, you mean," returned the clerk, whose knowledge of Raffles and his Relics was really most comprehensive on the whole.
Then the clerk emerged from the recess devoted to the Raffles Relics, and the alarming interloper conducted his party to the window opposite the door.
And in my nervous anxiety to allay any suspicions aroused by my companion's extraordinary behavior, I outstayed even the eminent detective and his friends, saw them examine the Raffles Relics, heard them discuss me under my own nose, and at last was alone with the anemic clerk.
I was standing with my back to the chair in which I had been asleep; behind the chair was the round lodging-house table; and there, reposing on the cloth with the whiskey and sandwiches, was the whole collection of Raffles Relics which had occupied the lid of the silver-chest in the Black Museum at Scotland Yard!
I chose most carefully, and I replaced my relics with a mixed assortment of other people's which really look just as well.