“We’ve done nothing of the sort,” said Jackaby, a bit haughtily. “You’ve done the withholding. You’ve got my tuning fork—which, I remind you, I would like back. We have withheld nothing.”

“Oh, no?” The inspector held out a hand, and one of the uniformed men shuffled forward to hand him a folded paper. Marlowe opened it slowly. “Then I suppose this map, found in your office on Augur Lane, is not drawn on Arthur Bragg’s personal stationery, and written in the victim’s own hand?”

“Oh, that,” said Jackaby. “Yes well, that wasn’t withholding so much as borrowing, or possibly safekeeping.”

Marlowe said nothing, but filled his expression with even more reproach. The officers who had taken position at either side of Marlowe wore matching, humorless scowls that suggested a lifetime of taking themselves too seriously. One of them also had several large, pale gray splatters across his shoulders, which suggested Douglas the duck had excellent aim. They had drawn to a halt, but the swampy, sulfurous smell that accompanied them was gradually creeping its way into the cells.

“Oh, don’t look so put out,” said Jackaby. “You could have asked for it.”

“I’ve got plenty to ask,” Marlowe replied. He shot a glance my way and added, “Both of you. But we’ll be conducting this interrogation one at a time. Jackaby, I think it’s time you and I had a little talk.”

Marlowe nodded a silent command, and the cop with duck-poop epaulettes marched to the cell door and stood at military attention. “Detainees will move away from the door!” he barked. Jackaby, already halfway across the cell, rolled his eyes at the officer and took one more step backward. The man unlocked the door and slid it ajar. Jackaby stepped out, and the guard eyed him with suspicion as he slammed it shut. This fellow managed to make Marlowe seem fun.

Jackaby, Marlowe, and the overzealous guard disappeared down the hallway, leaving the second cheerless policeman to keep an eye on me, presumably because I could get into far too much trouble if left to my own devices in a locked, eight-by-ten cell. It sank in that I had, in fact, been left alone in an eight-by-ten cell, and I began to feel a swelling sensation of helplessness. I fidgeted, worrying the fringe on my new dress.

This was all so preposterous. I don’t know why I felt more secure in the presence of a strange man I had known for less than a day—particularly one whom I had been warned to avoid by nearly everyone I had met—but I hoped that they would be back soon, all the same.