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with the air of one who had intended this to happen all along. 'Putting me on the lead, are you?' he said. 'Yes of course, I know it's a kind of prestige. It shows that I am a very valuable dog.' He wagged his tail. Since there seemed nobody to oppose Hannibal walking in the churchyard with his master, suitably secured as he was by a stalwart lead, Tommy wandered round, checking perhaps Tuppence's researches of a former day.
    He looked first at a worn stone monument more or less behind a little side door into the church. It was, he thought, probably one of the oldest. There were several of them there, most of them bearing dates in the eighteen-hundreds. There was one, however, that Tommy looked at longest.
    'Odd,' he said, 'damned odd.'
    Hannibal looked up at him. He did not understand this piece of Master's conversation. He saw nothing about the gravestone to interest a dog. He sat down, looked up at his master enquiringly.

Postern of Fate

Chapter 5
    THE WHITE ELEPHANT SALE
    Tuppence was pleasurably surprised to find the brass lamp which she and Tommy now regarded with such repulsion welcomed with the utmost warmth.
    'How very good of you, Mrs Beresford, to bring us something as nice as that. Most interesting, most interesting. I suppose it must have come from abroad on your travels once.'
    'Yes. We bought it in Egypt,' said Tuppence.
    She was quite doubtful by this time, a period of eight to ten years having passed, as to where she had bought it. It might have been Damascus, she thought, and it might equally well have been Baghdad or possibly Tehran. But Egypt, she thought, since Egypt was doubtless in the news at this moment, would be far more interesting. Besides, it looked rather Egyptian. Clearly, if she had got it from any other country, it dated from some period when they had been copying Egyptian work.
    'Really,' she said, 'it's rather big for our house, so I thought -'
    'Oh, I think really we ought to raffle it,' said Miss Little. Miss Little was more or less in charge of things. Her local nickname was 'The Parish Pump', mainly because she was so well informed about all things that happened in the parish. Her surname was misleading. She was a large woman of ample proportions. Her Christian name was Dorothy, but she was always called Dotty.
    'I hope you're coming to the sale, Mrs Beresford?'
    Tuppence assured her that she was coming.
    'I can hardly wait to buy,' she said chattily.
    'Oh, I'm so glad you feel like that.'
    'I think it's a very good thing,' said Tuppence. 'I mean, the White Elephant idea, because it's - well, it is so true, isn't it? I mean, what's one person's white elephant is somebody else's pearl beyond price.'
    'Ah, really, we must tell that to the vicar,' said Miss Price-Ridley, an angular lady with a lot of teeth. 'Oh yes, I'm sure he would be very much amused.'
    'That papier-mâché basin, for instance,' said Tuppence, raising this particular trophy up.
    'Oh really, do you think anyone will buy that?'
    'I shall buy it myself if it's for sale when I come here tomorrow,' said Tuppence.
    'But surely, nowadays, they have such pretty plastic washing-up bowls.'
    'I'm not very fond of plastic,' said Tuppence. 'That's a really good papier-mâché bowl that you've got there. I mean, if you put things down in that, lots of china together, they wouldn't break. And there's an old-fashioned tin-opener too. The kind with a bull's head that one never sees nowadays.'
    'Oh, but it's such hard work, that. Don't you think the ones that you put on an electric thing are much better?'
    Conversation on these lines went on for a short time and then Tuppence asked if there were any services that she could render.
    'Ah, dear Mrs Beresford, perhaps you would arrange the curio stall. I'm sure you're very artistic.'
    'Not really artistic at all,' said Tuppence, 'but I would love to arrange the stall for you. You must tell me if I'm doing it wrong,' she added.
    'Oh, it's so nice to have some extra help. We are so pleased to