He opened the paper, revealing a broken piece of corrugated cardboard and a large square dark-brown envelope.
"Ah, to be sure! Phonograph records." He glanced about the apartment. "But, I say, where did the lady keep the bally machine?"
"You'll find it in the foyer," said Markham wearily, without turning. He knew that Vance's chatter was only the outward manifestation of serious and perplexed thinking; and he was waiting with what patience he could muster.
Vance sauntered idly through the glass doors into the little reception-hall, and stood gazing abstractedly at a console phonograph of Chinese Chippendale design which stood against the wall at one end. The squat cabinet was partly covered with a prayer-rug, and upon it sat a polished bronze flower-bowl.
"At any rate, it doesn't look phonographic," he remarked. "But why the prayer-rug?" He examined it casually. "Anatolian—probably called a Cæsarian for sale purposes. Not very valuable—too much on the Oushak type. . . . Wonder what the lady's taste in music was. Victor Herbert, doubtless." He turned back the rug and lifted the lid of the cabinet. There was a record already on the machine, and he leaned over and looked at it.
"My word! The Andante from Beethoven's C-Minor Symphony!" he exclaimed cheerfully. "You know the movement, of course, Markham. The most perfect Andante ever written." He wound up the machine. "I think a little good music might clear the atmosphere and volatilize our perturbation, what?"
