arge,
heavy traveling chest in the bedroom of the guest apartment occupied
temporarily by Laird and Lady Duncan, working with the lock. "One
position of a lock is just as relevant as the other so you can't work
with the bolt. But the pin-tumblers in the cylinder, now, that's a
different matter. A lock's built so that the breaks in the tumblers
are not related to the surface of the cylinder when the key is out,
but there is a relation when the key's _in_, so by taking advantage of
that relevancy--Ah!"

The lock clicked open.

Lord Darcy raised the lid gently.

"Carefully, my lord!" Master Sean said in a warning voice. "He's got a
spell on the thing! Let me do it." He made Lord Darcy stand back and
then lifted the lid of the heavy trunk himself. When it was leaning
back against the wall, gaping open widely on its hinges, Master Sean
took a long look at the trunk and its lid without touching either of
them. There was a second lid on the trunk, a thin one obviously
operated by a simple bolt.

Master Sean took his sorcerer's staff, a five-foot, heavy rod made of
the wood of the quicken tree or mountain ash, and touched the inner
lid. Nothing happened. He touched the bolt. Nothing.

"Hm-m-m," Master Sean murmured thoughtfully. He glanced around the
room, and his eyes fell on a heavy stone doorstop. "That ought to do
it." He walked over, picked it up, and carried it back to the chest.
Then he put it on the rim of the chest in such a position that if the
lid were to fall it would be stopped by the doorstop.

Then he put his hand in as if to lift the inner lid.

The heavy outer lid swung forward and down of its own accord, moving
with blurring speed, and slammed viciously against the doorstop.

Lord Darcy massaged his right wrist gently, as if he felt where the
lid would have hit if he had tried to open the inner lid. "Triggered
to slam if a human being sticks a hand in there, eh?"

"Or a head, my lord. Not very effectual if you know what to look for.
There are better spells than that for guarding things. Now we'll see
what his lordship wants to protect so badly that he practices sorcery
without a license." He lifted the lid again, and then opened the inner
lid. "It's safe now, my lord. _Look at this!_"

Lord Darcy had already seen. Both men looked in silence at the
collection of paraphernalia on the first tray of the chest. Master
Sean's busy fingers carefully opened the tissue paper packing of one
after another of