Only Mr Pointz took no part in the proceedings. He remained in his seat sipping his wine and smiling sardonically.

‘Oh, dear,’ said Eve, still in her artificial manner, ‘How dreadful! Where can it have rolled to? I can’t find it anywhere.’

One by one the assistant searchers rose to their feet.

‘It’s disappeared all right, Pointz,’ said Sir George smiling.

‘Very nicely done,’ said Mr Pointz, nodding approval. ‘You’d make a very good actress, Eve. Now the question is, have you hidden it somewhere or have you got it on you?’

‘Search me,’ said Eve dramatically.

Mr Pointz’ eye sought out a large screen in the corner of the room.

He nodded towards it and then looked at Lady Marroway and Mrs Rustington.

‘If you ladies will be so good–’

‘Why, certainly,’ said Lady Marroway, smiling.

The two women rose.

Lady Marroway said, ‘Don’t be afraid, Mr Pointz. We’ll vet her properly.’

The three went behind the screen.

The room was hot. Evan Llewellyn flung open the window. A news vendor was passing. Evan threw down a coin and the man threw up a paper.

Llewellyn unfolded it.

‘Hungarian situation’s none too good,’ he said.

‘That the local rag?’ asked Sir George. ‘There’s a horse I’m interested in ought to have run at Haldon today–Natty Boy.’

‘Leo,’ said Mr Pointz. ‘Lock the door. We don’t want those damned waiters popping in and out till this business is over.’

‘Natty Boy won three to one,’ said Evan.

‘Rotten odds,’ said Sir George.

‘Mostly Regatta news,’ said Evan, glancing over the sheet.

The three young women came out from the screen.

‘Not a sign of it,’ said Janet Rustington.

‘You can take it from me she hasn’t got it on her,’ said Lady Marroway.

Mr Pointz thought he would be quite ready to take it from her. There was a grim tone in her voice and he felt no doubt that the search had been thorough.

‘Say, Eve, you haven’t swallowed it?’ asked Mr Leathern anxiously. ‘Because maybe that wouldn’t be too good for you.’

‘I’d have seen her do that,’ said Leo Stein quietly. ‘I was watching her. She didn’t put anything in her mouth.’

‘I couldn’t swallow a great thing all points like that,’ said Eve. She put her hands on her hips and looked at Mr Pointz. ‘What about it, big boy?’ she asked.

‘You stand over there where you are and don’t move,’ said that gentleman.

Among them, the men stripped the table and turned it upside down. Mr Pointz examined every inch of it. Then he transferred his attention to the chair on which Eve had been sitting and those on either side of her.

The thoroughness of the search left nothing to be desired. The other four men joined in and the women also. Eve Leathern stood by the wall near the screen and laughed with intense enjoyment.