"ARE you in a quandary?" the visitor asked.

"Yes, about giving them back." Peter Baron stood smiling at her and
rapping his packet on the palm of his hand. "What do you advise?"

She herself smiled now, with her eyes on the sealed parcel. "Back to
whom?"

"The man of whom I bought the table."

"Ah then, they're not from YOUR family?"

"No indeed, the piece of furniture in which they were hidden is not
an ancestral possession. I bought it at second hand--you see it's
old--the other day in the King's Road. Obviously the man who sold it
to me sold me more than he meant; he had no idea (from his own point
of view it was stupid of him), that there was a hidden chamber or
that mysterious documents were buried there. Ought I to go and tell
him? It's rather a nice question."

"Are the papers of value?" Mrs. Ryves inquired.

"I haven't the least idea. But I can ascertain by breaking a seal."

"Don't!" said Mrs. Ryves, with much expression. She looked grave
again.

"It's rather tantalising--it's a bit of a problem," Baron went on,
turning his packet over.