The chairman motioned to the high official.

"If you would be good enough to open the box, sir," he said. "Our duty
is now concluded."

As the high official laid his hand on the lid the other men gathered
round with craning necks and expectant eyes. The lid was lifted:
somebody sighed deeply. And Spargo pushed his own head and eyes nearer.

The box was empty!

Empty, as anything that can be empty is empty! thought Spargo: there
was literally nothing in it. They were all staring into the interior of
a plain, time-worn little receptacle, lined out with old-fashioned
chintz stuff, such as our Mid-Victorian fore-fathers were familiar
with, and containing--nothing.

"God bless my soul!" exclaimed the chairman. "This is--dear me!--why,
there is nothing in the box!"

"That," remarked the high official, drily, "appears to be obvious."

The chairman looked at the secretary.

"I understood the box was valuable, Mr. Myerst," he said, with the
half-injured air of a man who considers himself to have been robbed of
an exceptionally fine treat. "Valuable!"

Myerst coughed.