“It is part of the coin,” said I. “There can be no doubt of that. I examined the cast that Dr. Thorndyke made and I recognize this as the same. There is the lower part of the bust, the letters C A—the first two letters of Carolus—and the tiny elephant and castle. That is conclusive. This is the mould from which that electrotype was made. But I had better hand it to Dr. Thorndyke to compare with the cast that he has.”
theI carefully bestowed the fragment in my tobacco-pouch, as the safest place for the time being, and meanwhile Miss D’Arblay looked fixedly at me with a very singular expression.
“You realize,” she said in a hushed voice, “what this means. He was in here last night.”
HeI nodded. The same conclusion had instantly occurred to me, and a very uncomfortable one it was. There wa
