"We can have our
drink up there, while Colonel Rand's looking at the pistols.... Coming
with us, Geraldine?"
Geraldine rose, not too steadily, her glass still in her hand, and took
Rand's left arm. Gladys, seeing Nelda moving in on the detective's right,
took his other arm. Nelda was barely successful in suppressing a look of
murderous anger. The double doorway into the hall was just wide enough
for Rand and his two flankers to pass through; Nelda had to fall in a
couple of paces rear of center, and wasn't able to come up into line
until they were in the hall upstairs.
"There's the gunroom." Gladys pointed. "And that's your room, over
there." As she spoke, Walters came out of the doorway she had indicated.
"Your bags are unpacked, sir," he reported. Then he told Rand where he
would find his things, and where the bath was.
There was a brief discussion of drinks. The butler received his
instructions and went down the stairway; Rand broke up the feminine
formation around him and ushered the ladies ahead of him into the
gunroom.
It was much as he remembered it from his visit of two years before.
There was a desk in one corner, and back of it a short workbench and
tool-cabinet. There was a long table in the middle of the room, its top
covered with green baize, upon which many flat rectangular boxes of
hardwood rested--some walnut, some rosewood, some quartered oak.
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