"This box," said Mr. Meyerstein, bending attentively over the carven brass coffer upon the table, "is certainly of considerable value, and possibly almost unique."  
Nayland Smith glanced across at me with a slight smile. Mr. Meyerstein ran one fat finger tenderly across the heavily embossed figures, which, like barnacles, encrusted the sides and lid of the weird curio which we had summoned him to appraise.
 
"What do you think, Lewison?" he added, glancing over his shoulder at the clerk who accompanied him.
 
Lewison, whose flaxen hair and light blue eyes almost served to mask his Semitic origin, shrugged his shoulders in a fashion incongruous in one of his complexion, though characteristic in one of his name.
 
"It is as you say, Mr. Meyerstein, an example of early Tûlun-Nûr work," he said. "It may be sixteenth century or even earlier. The Kûren treasure-chest in the Hague Collection has points of similarity, but the workmanship of this specimen is infinitely finer."
 
"In a word, gentlemen," snapped Nayland Smith, rising from the arm-chair in which he had been sitting, and beginning restlessly to pace the room, "in a word, you would be prepared to make me a substantial offer for this box?"
 
Mr. Meyerstein, his shrewd eyes twinkling behind the pebbles of his pince-nez, straightened himself slowly, turned in the ponderous manner of a fat man, and readjusted the pince-nez upon his nose. He cleared his throat.
 
"I have not yet seen the interior of the box, Mr. Smith," he said.
 
Smith paused in his perambulation of the carpet and stared hard at the celebrated art dealer.
 
"Unfortunately," he replied, "the key is missing."
 
"Ah!" cried the assistant, Lewison, excitedly, "you are mistaken, sir! Coffers of this description and workmanship are nearly always complicated conjuring tricks; they rarely open by any such rational means as lock and key. For instance, the Kûren treasure-chest to which I referred, opens by an intricate process involving the pressing of certain knobs in the design, and the turning of others."
 
"It was ultimately opened," said Mr. Meyerstein, with a faint note of professional envy in his voice, "by one of Christie's experts."
 
"Does my memory mislead me," I interrupted, "or was it not regarding the possession of the chest to which you refer, that the celebrated case of 'Hague versus Jacobs' arose?"
 
"You are quite right, Dr. Petrie," said Meyerstein, turning to me. "The original owner, a member of the Younghusband Expedition, had been unable to open the chest. When opened at Christie's it proved to contain jewels and other valuables. It was a curious case, wasn't it, Lewison?" turning to his clerk.
 
"Very," agreed the other absently; then—"Have you endeavored to open this box, Mr. Smith?"
 
Nayland Smith shook his head grimly.
 
"From its weight," said Meyerstein, "I am inclined to think that the contents might prove of interest. With your permission I will endeavor to open it."
 
Nayland Smith, tugging reflectively at the lobe of his left ear, stood looking at the expert. Then—
 
"I do not care to attempt it at present," he said.
 
Meyerstein and his clerk stared at the speaker in surprise.
 
"But you would be mad," cried the former, "if you accepted an offer for the box, whilst ignorant of the nature of its contents."
 
"But I have invited no offer," said Smith. "I do not propose to sell."
 
Meyerstein adjusted his pince-nez again.
 
"I am a business man," he said, "and I will make a business proposal: A hundred guineas for............