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In my criminal work anything that wears skirts is a lady, until the lawproves her otherwise. From the frayed and slovenly petticoats of thewoman who owns a poultry stand in the market and who has grown wealthyby selling chickens at twelve ounces to the pound, or the silk sweep ofMamie Tracy, whose diamonds have been stolen down on the avenue, or thestaidly respectable black and middle-aged skirt of the client whosehusband has found an affinity partial to laces and fripperies, and hasrun off with her—all the wearers are ladies, and as such announced byHawes. In fact, he carries it to excess. He speaks of his wash lady,with a husband who is an ash merchant, and he announced one day in someexcitement, that the lady who had just gone out had appropriated all theloose change out of the pocket of his overcoat.

So when Hawes announced a lady, I took my feet off my desk, put down thebrief I had been reading, and rose perfunctorily. With my first glanceat my visitor, however, I threw away my cigar, and I have heard since,settled my tie. That this client was different was borne in on me atonce by the way she entered the room. She had poise in spite ofembarrassment, and her face when she raised her veil was white, refined,and young.

"I did not send in my name," she said, when she saw me glancing down forthe card Hawes usually puts on my table. "It was advice I wanted, andI—I did not think the name would matter."

She was more composed, I think, when she found me considerably olderthan herself. I saw her looking furtively at the graying places over myears. I am only thirty-five, as far as that goes, but my family,although it keeps its hair, turns gray early—a business asset but asocial handicap.

"Won't you sit down?" I asked, pushing out a chair, so that she wouldface the light, while I remained in shadow. Every doctor and everylawyer knows that trick. "As far as the name goes, perhaps you wouldbetter tell me the trouble first. Then, if I think it indispensable, youcan tell me."

She acquiesced to this and sat for a moment silent, her gaze absently onthe windows of the building across. In the morning light my firstimpression was verified. Only too often the raising of a woman's veil inmy office reveals the ravages of tears, or rouge, or dissipation. My newclient turned fearlessly to the window an unlined face, with a clearskin, healthily pale. From where I sat, her profile was beautiful, inspite of its drooping suggestion of trouble; her first embarrassmentgone, she had forgotten herself and was intent on her errand.

"I hardly know how to begin," she said, "but suppose"—slowly—"supposethat a man, a well-known man, should leave home without warning, nottaking any clothes except those he wore, and saying he was coming hometo dinner, and he—he—"

"How long has he been gone?" I asked. I had heard exactly the same thingbefore, but to leave a woman like that, hardly more than a girl, andlovely!

"I should think it ought to be looked into," I said decisively, and gotup. Somehow I couldn't sit quietly. A lawyer who is worth anything isalways a partisan, I suppose, and I never hear of a man deserting hiswife that I am not indignant, the virtuous scorn of the unmarried man,perhaps. "But you will have to tell me more than that. Did thisgentleman have any bad habits? That is, did he—er—drink?"

"Not to excess. He had been forbidden anything of that sort by hisphysician. He played bridge for money, but I—believe he was ratherlucky." She colored uncomfortably.

"He had been. His wife died when I—" She stopped and bit her lip. Thenit was not her husband, after all! Oddly enough, the sun came out justat that moment, spilling a pool of sunlight at her feet, on the dustyrug with its tobacco-bitten scars.

But with the realization that I had not a case of desertion on my hands,I had to view the situation from a new angle.

"No. Never. He was away a great deal, but I always knew where to findhim." Her voice broke again and her chin quivered. I thought it wise toreassure her.

"Don't let us worry about this until we are sure it is serious," I said."Sometimes the things that seem most mysterious have the simplestexplanations. He may have written and the letter have miscarriedor—even a slight accident would account—" I saw I was blundering; shegrew white and wide-eyed. "But, of course, that's unlikely too. He wouldhave papers to identify him."

"His pockets were always full of envelopes and things like that," sheassented eagerly.

"Don't you think I ought to know his name?" I asked. "It need not beknown outside of the office, and this is a sort of confessional anyhow,or worse. People tell things to their lawyer that they wouldn't think oftelling the priest."

"My name is Fleming, Margery Fleming," she said after a second'shesitation, "and my father, Mr. Allan Fleming, is the man. Oh, Mr. Knox,what are we going to do? He has been gone for more than a week!"

No wonder she had wished to conceal the identity of the missing man. SoAllan Fleming was lost! A good many highly respectable citizens wouldhope that he might never be found. Fleming, state treasurer, delightfulcompanion, polished gentleman and successful politician of the criminaltype. Outside in the corridor the office boy was singing under hisbreath. "Oh once there was a miller," he sang, "who lived in a mill." Itbrought back to my mind instantly the reform meeting at the city hall ayear before, where for a few hours we had blown the feeble spark ofprotest against machine domination to a flame. We had sung a song tothat very tune, and with this white-faced girl across from me, its wordscame back with revolting truth. It had been printed and circulatedthrough the hall.

I put the song out of my mind with a shudder. "I am more than sorry," Isaid. I was, too; whatever he may have been, he washer father. "Andof course there are a number of reasons why this ought not to be known,for a time at least. After all, as I say, there may be a dozen simpleexplanations, and—there are exigencies in politics—"

"I hate politics!" she broke in suddenly. "The very name makes me ill.When I read of women wanting to—to vote and all that, I wonder if theyknow what it means to have to be polite to dreadful people, people whohave even been convicts, and all that. Why, our last butler had been aprize fighter!" She sat upright with her hands on the arms of the chair."That's another thing, too, Mr. Knox. The day after father went away,Carter left. And he has not come back."

"Yes. He served luncheon the day after father went away, and the maidssay he went away immediately after. He was not there that evening toserve dinner, but—he came back late that night, and got into thehouse, using his key to the servants entrance. He slept there, the maidssaid, but he was gone before the servants were up and we have not seenhim since."

"We'll go back to Carter again," I said. "Your father has not been ill,has he? I mean recently."

"I can not think of anything except that he had a tooth pulled." She wasquick to resent my smile. "Oh, I know I'm not helping you," sheexclaimed, "but I have thought over everything until I can not think anymore. I always end where I begin."

"He forgot my birthday, two weeks ago," she said. "It was the first onehe had ever forgotten, in nineteen of them."

"What I meant was this," I explained. "People sometimes have sudden andunaccountable lapses of memory and at those times they are apt to strayaway from home. Has your father been worried lately?"

"He has not been himself at all. He has been irritable, even to me, andterrible to the servants. Only to Carter—he was never ugly to Carter.But I do not think it was a lapse of memory. When I remember how helooked that morning, I believe that he meant then to go away. It showshow he had changed, when he could think of going away without a word,and leaving me there alone."

"Please tell me how you happened to come to me," I urged. "I think youknow that I am both honored and pleased."

"I didn't know where to go," she confessed, "so I took the telephonedirectory, the classified part under 'Attorneys,' and after I shut myeyes, I put my finger haphazard on the page. It pointed to your name."

I am afraid I flushed at this, but it was a wholesome douche. In amoment I laughed.

"We will take it as an omen," I said, "and I will do all that I can. ButI am not a detective, Miss Fleming. Don't you think we ought to haveone?"

"Not the police!" she shuddered. "I thought you could do somethingwithout calling in a detective."

"Suppose you tell me what happened the day your father left, and how hewent away. Tell me the little things too. They may be straws that willpoint in a certain direction."

"In the first place," she began, "we live on Monmouth Avenue. There arejust the two of us, and the servants: a cook, two housemaids, alaundress, a butler and a chauffeur. My father spends much of his timeat the capital, and in the last two years, since my old governess wentback to Germany, at those times I usually go to mother's sisters atBellwood—Miss Letitia and Miss Jane Maitland."

I nodded: I knew the Maitland ladies well. I had drawn four differentwills for Miss Letitia in the last year.

"My father went away on the tenth of May. You say to tell you all abouthis going, but there is nothing to tell. We have a machine, but it wasbeing repaired. Father got up from breakfast, picked up his hat andwalked out of the house. He was irritated at a letter he had read at thetable—"

"He took it with him. I knew he was disturbed, for he did not even sayhe was going. He took a car, and I thought he was on his way to hisoffice. He did not come home that night and I went to the office thenext morning. The stenographer said he had not been there. He is not atPlattsburg, because they have been trying to call him from there on thelong distance telephone every day."

"Why don't you tell me everything?" I asked. "You may be keeping backthe one essential point."

She flushed. Then she opened her pocket-book and gave me a slip of roughpaper. On it, in careless figures, was the number "eleven twenty-two."That was all.

"I was afraid you would think it silly," she said. "It was such ameaningless thing. You see, the second night after father left, I wasnervous and could not sleep. I expected him home at any time and I keptlistening for his step down-stairs. About three o'clock I was sure Iheard some one in the room below mine—there was a creaking as if theperson were walking carefully. I felt relieved, for I thought he hadcome back. But I did not hear the door into his bedroom close, and I gotmore and more wakeful. Finally I got up and slipped along the hall tohis room. The door was open a few inches and I reached in and switchedon the electric lights. I had a queer feeling before I turned on thelight that there was some one standing close to me, but the room wasempty, and the hall, too."

"When I saw the room was empty I went in. The paper had been pinned to apillow on the bed. At first I thought it had been dropped or had blownthere. When I saw the pin I was startled. I went back to my room andrang for Annie, the second housemaid, who is also a sort of personalmaid of mine. It was half-past three o'clock when Annie came down. Itook her into father's room and showed her the paper. She was sure itwas not there when she folded back the bed clothes for the night atnine o'clock."

"Eleven twenty-two," I repeated. "Twice eleven is twenty-two. But thatisn't very enlightening."

"No," she admitted. "I thought it might be a telephone number, and Icalled up all the eleven twenty-twos in the city."

"We are not brilliant, certainly," I said at last. "In the first place,Miss Fleming, if I thought the thing was very serious I would notlaugh—but no doubt a day or two will see everything straight. But, togo back to this eleven twenty-two—did you rouse the servants and havethe house searched?"

"Yes, Annie said Carter had come back and she went to waken him, butalthough his door was locked inside, he did not answer. Annie and Iswitched on all the lights on the lower floor from the top of thestairs. Then we went down together and looked around. Every window anddoor was locked, but in father's study, on the first floor, two drawersof his desk were standing open. And in the library, the littlecompartment in my writing-table, where I keep my house money, had beenbroken open and the money taken."

"Nothing. The silver on the sideboard in the dining-room, plenty ofvaluable things in the cabinet in the drawing-room—nothing wasdisturbed."

"It might have been Carter," I reflected. "Did he know where you keptyour house money?"

"It is possible, but I hardly think so. Besides, if he was going tosteal, there were so many more valuable things in the house. My mother'sjewels as well as my own were in my dressing-room, and the door was notlocked."

"They had been disturbed," she admitted. "My grandmother left each ofher children some unstrung pearls. They were a hobby with her. Aunt Janeand Aunt Letitia never had theirs strung, but my mother's were made intodifferent things, all old-fashioned. I left them locked in a drawer inmy sitting-room, where I have always kept them. The following morningthe drawer was unlocked and partly open, but nothing was missing."

"All but one ring, which I rarely remove from my finger." I followed hereyes. Under her glove was the outline of a ring, a solitaire stone.

"It does not sound like an ordinary burglary," I reflected. "But I amafraid I have no imagination. No doubt what you have told me would bemeat and drink to a person with an analytical turn of mind. I can'tdeduct. Nineteen from thirty-five leaves sixteen, according to my mentalprocess, although I know men who could make the difference nothing."

I believe she thought I was a little mad, for her face took on again itsdespairing look.

"Wemust find him, Mr. Knox," she insisted as she got up. "If you knowof a detective that you can trust, please get him. But you canunderstand that the unexplained absence of the state treasurer must bekept secret. One thing I am sure of: he is being kept away. You don'tknow what enemies he has! Men like Mr. Schwartz, who have no scruples,no principle."

"Schwartz!" I repeated in surprise. Henry Schwartz was the boss of hisparty in the state; the man of whom one of his adversaries had said,with the distinct approval of the voting public, that he was so low inthe scale of humanity that it would require a special dispensation ofHeaven to raise him to the level of total degradation. But he andFleming were generally supposed to be captain and first mate of thepirate craft that passed with us for the ship of state.

"Mr. Schwartz and my father are allies politically," the girl explainedwith heightened color, "but they are not friends. My father is agentleman."

The inference I allowed to pass unnoticed, and as if she feared she hadsaid too much, the girl rose. When she left, a few minutes later, it waswith the promise that she would close the Monmouth Avenue house and goto her aunts at Bellwood, at once. For myself, I pledged a thoroughsearch for her father, and began it by watching the scarlet wing on herhat through the top of the elevator cage until it had descended out ofsight.

I am afraid it was a queer hodgepodge of clues and sentiment that Ipoured out to Hunter, the detective, when he came up late thatafternoon.

"They're rotten clear through," he reflected. "This administration isworse than the last, and it was a peach. There have been more suicidesthan I could count on my two hands, in the last ten years. I warnyou—you'd be better out of this mess."

"What do you think about the eleven twenty-two?" I asked as he got upand buttoned his coat.

"Well, it might mean almost anything. It might be that many dollars, orthe time a train starts, or it might be the eleventh and thetwenty-second letters of the alphabet—k—v."

"You'd better stick to the law, Mr. Knox," he said from the door. "Wedon't use Latin in the detective business."

CHAPTER II

UNEASY APPREHENSIONS

Plattsburg was not the name of the capital, but it will do for thisstory. The state doesn't matter either. You may take your choice, likethe story Mark Twain wrote, with all kinds of weather at the beginning,so the reader could take his pick.

We will say that my home city is Manchester. I live with my marriedbrother, his wife and two boys. Fred is older than I am, and he is anexceptional brother. On the day he came home from his wedding trip, Iwent down with my traps on a hansom, in accordance with a prearrangedschedule. Fred and Edith met me inside the door.

"Here's your latch-key, Jack," Fred said, as he shook hands. "Only onestipulation—remember we are strangers in the vicinity and try to gethome before the neighbors are up. We have our reputations to think of."

"There is no hour for breakfast," Edith said, as she kissed me. "Youhave a bath of your own, and don't smoke in the drawing-room."

I had been there now for six years. I had helped to raise two youngKnoxes—bully youngsters, too: the oldest one could use boxing-gloveswhen he was four—and the finest collie pup in our end of the state. Iwanted to raise other things—the boys liked pets—but Edith was likeall women, she didn't care for animals.

I had a rabbit-hutch built and stocked in the laundry, and a dove-coteon the roof. I used the general bath, and gave up my tub to a youngalligator I got in Florida, and every Sunday the youngsters and I had agreat time trying to teach it to do tricks. I have always taken it alittle hard that Edith took advantage of my getting the measles fromBilly, to clear out every animal in the house. She broke the news to megently, the day the rash began to fade, maintaining that, having lostone cook through the alligator escaping from his tub and being mistaken,in the gloom of the back-stairs, for a rubber boot, and picked up underthe same misapprehension, she could not risk another cook.

On the day that Margery Fleming came to me about her father, I went homein a state of mixed emotion. Dinner was not a quiet meal: Fred and Italked politics, generally, and as Fred was on one side and I on theother there was always an argument on.

"What about Fleming?" I asked at last, when Fred had declared that inthese days of corruption, no matter what the government was, he was"forninst" it. "Hasn't he been frightened into reform?"

"Bad egg," he said, jabbing his potato as if it had been a politician,"and there's no way to improve a bad egg except to hold your nose.That's what the public is doing; holding its nose."

"Fleming is a rascal, daughter or no daughter," Fred persisted. "Eversince he and his gang got poor Butler into trouble and then left him tokill himself as the only way out, I have felt that there was somethingcoming to all of them—Hansen, Schwartz and the rest. I saw Fleming onthe street to-day."

"'Hasn't he a daughter!'" he quoted. "Yes, I saw him, Jack, this veryday, in an unromantic four-wheeler, and he was swearing at a policeman."

"Chestnut and Union. His cab had been struck by a car, and badlydamaged, but the gentleman refused to get out. No doubt you could getthe details from the corner-man."

"Look here, Fred," I said earnestly. "Keep that to yourself, will you?And you too, Edith? It's a queer story, and I'll tell you sometime."

"Don't get mixed up with those people, Jack," she advised. "Margery's adear girl, but her father practically killed Henry Butler, and HenryButler married my cousin."

"You needn't make it a family affair," I protested. "I have only seenthe girl once."

But Edith smiled. "I know what I know," she said. "How extravagant ofyou to send Bobby that enormous hobby-horse!"

"The boy has to learn to ride sometime. In four years he can have apony, and I'm going to see that he has it. He'll be eight by that time."

"You'll be forty, Jack, and it's a mighty unattractive man who gets pastforty without being sought and won by some woman. You'll be buying—"

"I will be thirty-nine," I said with dignity, "and as far as beingsought and won goes, I am so overwhelmed by Fred's misery that I don'tintend to marry at all. If I do—if I do—it will be to some girl whoturns and runs the other way every time she sees me."

"The oldest trick in the box," Edith scoffed. "What's that thing Fred'salways quoting: 'A woman is like a shadow; follow her, she flies; flyfrom her, she follows.'"

In the library Fred got up from his desk and gathered up his papers. "Ican't think with you two whispering there," he said, "I'm going to theden."

As he slammed the door into his workroom Edith picked up her skirts andscuttled after him.

"How dare you run away like that?" she called. "You promised me—" Thedoor closed behind her.

"'Follow her, she flies; fly from her, she follows'—oh, wife andmother!" I called.

"For Heaven's sake, Edith," Fred's voice rose irritably. "If you andJack are going to talk all evening, go and sit onhis knee and let mealone. The way you two flirt under my nose is a scandal. Do you hearthat, Jack?"

"Good night, Edith," I called, "I have left you a kiss on the upper lefthand panel of the door. And I want to ask you one more question: what ifI fly from the woman and she doesn't follow?"

"Thank your lucky stars," Fred called in a muffled voice, and I leftthem to themselves.

I had some work to do at the office, work that the interview with Hunterhad interrupted, and half past eight that night found me at my desk. Butmy mind strayed from the papers before me. After a useless effort toconcentrate, I gave it up as useless, and by ten o'clock I was on thestreet again, my evening wasted, the papers in the libel case of theStar against theEagle untouched on my desk, and I the victim of anuneasy apprehension that took me, almost without volition, to theneighborhood of the Fleming house on Monmouth Avenue. For it hadoccurred to me that Miss Fleming might not have left the house that dayas she had promised, might still be there, liable to another intrusionby the mysterious individual who had a key to the house.

It was a relief, consequently, when I reached its corner, to find nolights in the building. The girl had kept her word. Assured of that, Ilooked at the house curiously. It was one of the largest in the city,not wide, but running far back along the side street; a small yard witha low iron fence and a garage, completed the property. The street lightsleft the back of the house in shadow, and as I stopped in the shelter ofthe garage, I was positive that I heard some one working with a rearwindow of the empty house. A moment later the sounds ceased and muffledfootsteps came down the cement walk. The intruder made no attempt toopen the iron gate; against the light I saw him put a leg over the lowfence, follow it up with the other, and start up the street, still withpeculiar noiselessness of stride. He was a short, heavy-shoulderedfellow in a cap, and his silhouette showed a prodigious length of arm.

I followed, I don't mind saying in some excitement. I had a vision ofgrabbing him from behind and leading him—or pushing him, under thecircumstances, in triumph to the police station, and another mentalpicture, not so pleasant, of being found on the pavement by somepasser-by, with a small punctuation mark ending my sentence of life. ButI was not apprehensive. I even remember wondering humorously if I shouldovertake him and press the cold end of my silver mounted fountain peninto the nape of his neck, if he would throw up his hands and surrender.I had read somewhere of a burglar held up in a similar way with ashoe-horn.

Our pace was easy. Once the man just ahead stopped and lighted acigarette, and the odor of a very fair Turkish tobacco came back to me.He glanced back over his shoulder at me and went on without quickeninghis pace. We met no policemen, and after perhaps five minutes walking,when the strain was growing tense, my gentleman of the rubber-soledshoes swung abruptly to the left, and—entered the police station!

I had occasion to see Davidson many times after that, during the strangedevelopment of the Fleming case; I had the peculiar experience later ofhaving him follow me as I had trailed him that night, and I had occasiononce to test the strength of his long arms when he helped to thrust methrough the transom at the White Cat, but I never met him without arecurrence of the sheepish feeling with which I watched him swagger upto the night sergeant and fall into easy conversation with the manbehind the desk. Standing in the glare from the open window, I had muchthe lost pride and self contempt of a wet cat sitting in the sun.

Two or three roundsmen were sitting against the wall, lazily, helmetsoff and coats open against the warmth of the early spring night. In aback room others were playing checkers and disputing noisily. Davidson'svoice came distinctly through the open windows.

"The house is closed," he reported. "But one of the basement windowsisn't shuttered and the lock is bad. I couldn't find Shields. He'dbetter keep an eye on it." He stopped and fished in his pockets with agrin. "This was tied to the knob of the kitchen door," he said, raisinghis voice for the benefit of the room, and holding aloft a piece ofpaper. "For Shields!" he explained, "and signed 'Delia.'"

The men gathered around him, even the sergeant got up and leanedforward, his elbows on his desk.

"Dear Tom," Davidson read, in a mincing falsetto, "We are closing upunexpected, so I won't be here to-night. I am going to Mamie Brennan'sand if you want to talk to me you can get me by calling up Anderson'sdrug-store. The clerk is a gentleman friend of mine. Mr. Carter, thebutler, told me before he left he would get me a place as parlor maid,so I'll have another situation soon. Delia."

The sergeant scowled. "I'm goin' to talk to Tom," he said, reaching outfor the note. "He's got a nice family, and things like that're bad forthe force."

I lighted the cigar, which had been my excuse for loitering on thepavement, and went on. It sounded involved for a novice, but if I couldfind Anderson's drug-store I could find Mamie Brennan; through MamieBrennan I would get Delia; and through Delia I might find Carter. I wasvague from that point, but what Miss Fleming had said of Carter had mademe suspicious of him. Under an arc light I made the first note in mynew business of man-hunter and it was something like this:

It was late when I reached the corner of Chestnut and Union Streets,where Fred had said Allan Fleming had come to grief in a cab. But thecorner-man had gone, and the night man on the beat knew nothing, ofcourse, of any particular collision.

"There's plinty of 'em every day at this corner," he said cheerfully."The department sinds a wagon here every night to gather up the pieces,autymobiles mainly. That trolley pole over there has been sliced offclean three times in the last month. They say a fellow ain't a graduateof the autymobile school till he can go around it on the sidewalkwithout hittin' it!"

I left him looking reminiscently at the pole, and went home to bed. Ihad made no headway, I had lost conceit with myself and a day andevening at the office, and I had gained the certainty that MargeryFleming was safe in Bellwood and the uncertain address of a servant whomight know something about Mr. Fleming.

I was still awake at one o'clock and I got up impatiently and consultedthe telephone directory. There were twelve Andersons in the city whoconducted drug-stores.

When I finally went to sleep, I dreamed that I was driving MargeryFleming along a street in a broken taxicab, and that all the buildingswere pharmacies and numbered eleven twenty-two.

CHAPTER III

NINETY-EIGHT PEARLS

After such a night I slept late. Edith still kept her honeymoon promiseof no breakfast hour and she had gone out with Fred when I camedown-stairs.

I have a great admiration for Edith, for her tolerance with my uncertainhours, for her cheery breakfast-room, and the smiling good nature of theservants she engages. I have a theory that, show me a sullen servant andI will show you a sullen mistress, although Edith herself disclaims allresponsibility and lays credit for the smile with which Katie brings inmy eggs and coffee, to largess on my part. Be that as it may, Katie is asmiling and personable young woman, and I am convinced that had shepicked up the alligator on the back-stairs and lost part of the end ofher thumb, she would have told Edith that she cut it off with the breadknife, and thus have saved to us Bessie the Beloved and her fascinatingtrick of taking the end of her tail in her mouth and spinning.

On that particular morning, Katie also brought me a letter, and Irecognized the cramped and rather uncertain writing of Miss JaneMaitland.

It was a very commonplace note: I had had one like it after everyboard-meeting of the orphans' home, Miss Maitland being on principle anaggressive minority. Also, having considerable mind, changing it becamealmost as ponderous an operation as moving a barn, although not nearlyso stable.

(Fred accuses me here of a very bad pun, and reminds me, quiteundeservedly, that the pun is the lowest form of humor.)

I came across Miss Jane's letter the other day, when I was gatheringthe material for this narrative, and I sat for a time with it in my handthinking over again the chain of events in which it had been the firstlink, a series of strange happenings that began with my acceptance ofthe invitation, and that led through ways as dark and tricks as vain asBret Harte's Heathen Chinee ever dreamed of, to the final scene at theWhite Cat. With the letter I had filed away a half dozen articles and Iranged them all on the desk in front of me: the letter, the bit of paperwith eleven twenty-two on it, that Margery gave me the first time I sawher; a note-book filled with jerky characters that looked like Arabicand were newspaper shorthand; a railroad schedule; a bullet, the latterslightly flattened; a cube-shaped piece of chalk which I put back in itsbox with a shudder, and labeled 'poison,' and a small gold buckle from aslipper, which I—at which I did not shudder.

I walked to the office that morning, and on the way I found andinterviewed the corner-man at Chestnut and Union. But he was of smallassistance. He remembered the incident, but the gentleman in the taxicabhad not been hurt and refused to give his name, saying he was merelypassing through the city from one railroad station to another, and didnot wish any notoriety.

At eleven o'clock Hunter called up; he said he was going after theaffair himself, but that it was hard to stick a dip net into thepolitical puddle without pulling out a lot more than you went after, orthan it was healthy to get. He was inclined to be facetious, and wantedto know if I had come across any more k. v's. Whereupon I put away thenotes I had made about Delia and Mamie Brennan and I heard him chuckleas I rang off.

I went to Bellwood that evening. It was a suburban town a dozen milesfrom the city, with a picturesque station, surrounded by lawns andcement walks. Street-cars had so far failed to spoil its tree-borderedstreets, and it was exclusive to the point of stagnation. The Maitlandplace was at the head of the main street, which had at one time been itsdrive. Miss Letitia, who was seventy, had had sufficient commercialinstinct, some years before, to cut her ancestral acres—theirancestral acres, although Miss Jane hardly counted—into building lots,except perhaps an acre which surrounded the house. Thus, the Maitlandladies were reputed to be extremely wealthy. And as they never spent anymoney, no doubt they were.

The homestead as I knew it, was one of impeccable housekeeping andunmitigated gloom. There was a chill that rushed from the old-fashionedcenter hall to greet the new-comer on the porch, and that seemed tofreeze up whatever in him was spontaneous and cheerful.

I had taken dinner at Bellwood before, and the memory was not hilarious.Miss Letitia was deaf, but chose to ignore the fact. With superbindifference she would break into the conversation with some whollyalien remark that necessitated a reassembling of one's ideas, making themeal a series of mental gymnastics. Miss Jane, through long practice,and because she only skimmed the surface of conversation, took hercerebral flights easily, but I am more unwieldy of mind.

Nor was Miss Letitia's dominance wholly conversational. Her sister Janewas her creature, alternately snubbed and bullied. To Miss Letitia,Jane, in spite of her sixty-five years, was still a child, and sometimesa bad one. Indeed, many a child of ten is more sophisticated. MissLetitia gave her expurgated books to read, and forbade her to readdivorce court proceedings in the newspapers. Once, a recreant housemaidpresenting the establishment with a healthy male infant, Jane was sentto the country for a month, and was only brought back when the house hadbeen fumigated throughout.

Poor Miss Jane! She met me with fluttering cordiality in the hall thatnight, safe in being herself for once, with the knowledge that MissLetitia always received me from a throne-like horsehair sofa in the backparlor. She wore a new lace cap, and was twitteringly excited.

"Our niece is here," she explained, as I took off my coat—everythingwas "ours" with Jane; "mine" with Letitia—"and we are having an ice atdinner. Please say that ices are not injurious, Mr. Knox. My sister isso opposed to them and I had to beg for this."

"On the contrary, the doctors have ordered ices for my young nephews," Isaid gravely, "and I dote on them myself."

Miss Jane beamed. Indeed, there was something almost unnaturally gayabout the little old lady all that evening. Perhaps it was the new lacecap. Later, I tried to analyze her manner, to recall exactly what shehad said, to remember anything that could possibly help. But I couldfind no clue to what followed.

Miss Letitia received me as usual, in the back parlor. Miss Fleming wasthere also, sewing by a window, and in her straight white dress with herhair drawn back and braided around her head, she looked even youngerthan before. There was no time for conversation. Miss Letitia launchedat once into the extravagance of both molasses and butter on the coloredorphans' bread and after a glance at me, and a quick comprehension frommy face that I had no news for her, the girl at the window bent over hersewing again.

"Molasses breeds worms," Miss Letitia said decisively. "So does pork.And yet those children think Heaven means ham and molasses three timesa day."

"You have had no news at all?" Miss Fleming said cautiously, her headbent over her work.

"None," I returned, under cover of the table linen to which MissLetitia's mind had veered. "I have a good man working on it." As sheglanced at me questioningly, "It needed a detective, Miss Fleming."Evidently another day without news had lessened her distrust of thepolice, for she nodded acquiescence and went on with her sewing. MissLetitia's monotonous monologue went on, and I gave it such attention asI might. For the lamps had been lighted, and with every movement of thegirl across, I could see the gleaming of a diamond on her engagementfinger.

"If I didn't watch her, Jane would ruin them," said Miss Letitia. "Shegives 'em apples when they keep their faces clean, and the bills forsoap have gone up double. Soap once a day's enough for a colored child.Do you smell anything burning, Knox?"

I sniffed and lied, whereupon Miss Letitia swept her black silk, hercolored orphans and her majestic presence out of the room. As the doorclosed, Miss Fleming put down her sewing and rose. For the first time Isaw how weary she looked.

"I do not dare to tell them, Mr. Knox," she said. "They are old, andthey hate him anyhow. I couldn't sleep last night. Suppose he shouldhave gone back, and found the house closed!"

"I suppose so, yes." She took up her sewing from the chair with a sigh."But I'm afraid he won't come—not soon. I have hemmed tea towels forAunt Letitia to-day until I am frantic, and all day I have beenwondering over something you said yesterday. You said, you remember,that you were not a detective, that some men could take nineteen fromthirty-five and leave nothing. What did you mean?"

"The fact is—I—you see," I blundered, "it was a—merely a figure ofspeech, a—speech of figures is more accurate,—" And then dinner wasannounced and I was saved. But although she said little or nothingduring the meal, I caught her looking across at me once or twice in abewildered, puzzled fashion. I could fairly see her revolving mydetestable figures in her mind.

Miss Letitia presided over the table in garrulous majesty. The two oldladies picked at their food, and Miss Jane had a spot of pink in eachwithered cheek. Margery Fleming made a brave pretense, but left herplate almost untouched. As for me, I ate a substantial masculine mealand half apologized for my appetite, but Letitia did not hear. She torethe board of managers to shreds with the roast, and denounced them withthe salad. But Jane was all anxious hospitality.

"Pleasedo eat your dinner," she whispered. "I made the salad myself.And I know what it takes to keep a big man going. Harry eats more thanLetitia and I together. Doesn't he, Margery?"

"Mrs. Stevens is an unmitigated fool. I said if they elected herpresident I'd not leave a penny to the home. That's why I sent for you,Knox." And to the maid, "Tell Heppie to wash those cups in luke-warmwater. They're the best ones. And not to drink her coffee out of them.She let her teeth slip and bit a piece out of one the last time."

"Harry Wardrop, a cousin's son, and—" she patted Margery's hand withits ring—"soon to be something closer."

"They put up an iron fence," Miss Letitia reverted somberly to hergrievance, "when a wooden one would have done. It was extravagance,ruinous extravagance."

"Harry stays with us when he is in Manchester," Miss Jane went on,nodding brightly across at Letitia as if she, too, were damning theexecutive board. "Lately, he has been almost all the time in Plattsburg.He is secretary to Margery's father. It is a position of considerableresponsibility, and we are very proud of him."

I had expected something of the sort, but the remainder of the meal hadsomehow lost its savor. There was a lull in the conversation whiledessert was being brought in. Miss Jane sat quivering, watching hersister's face for signs of trouble; the latter had subsided intomuttered grumbling, and Miss Fleming sat, one hand on the table, staringabsently at her engagement ring.

"You look like a fool in that cap, Jane," volunteered Letitia, while theplates were being brought in. "What's for dessert?"

"Well, you needn't," snapped Letitia, "I can hear you well enough. Youtold me it was junket."

"I said ice-cream, and you said it would be all right," poor Janeshrieked. "If you drink a cup of hot water after it, it won't hurt you."

"Fiddle," Letitia snapped unpleasantly. "I'm not going to freeze mystomach and then thaw it out like a drain pipe. Tell Heppie to put myice-cream on the stove."

So we waited until Miss Letitia's had been heated, and was brought in,sicklied over with pale hues, not of thought, but of confectioners'dyes. Miss Letitia ate it resignedly. "Like as not I'll break out, Idid the last time," she said gloomily. "I only hope I don't break out incolors."

The meal was over finally, but if I had hoped for another word alonewith Margery Fleming that evening, I was foredoomed to disappointment.Letitia sent the girl, not ungently, to bed, and ordered Jane out of theroom with a single curt gesture toward the door.

"You'd better wash those cups yourself, Jane," she said. "I don't seeany sense anyhow in getting out the best china unless there's realcompany. Besides, I'm going to talk business."

Poor, meek, spiritless Miss Jane! The situation was absurd in spite ofits pathos. She confided to me once that never in her sixty-five yearsof life had she bought herself a gown, or chosen the dinner. She wassnubbed with painstaking perseverance, and sent out of the room whensubjects requiring frank handling were under discussion. She was asunsophisticated as a child of ten, as unworldly as a baby, as—well,poor Miss Jane, again.

When the door had closed behind her, Miss Letitia listened for a moment,got up suddenly and crossing the room with amazing swiftness for heryears, pounced on the knob and threw it open again. But the passage wasempty; Miss Jane's slim little figure was disappearing into the kitchen.The older sister watched her out of sight, and then returned to her sofawithout deigning explanation.

"I didn't want to see you about the will, Mr. Knox," she began withoutprelude. "The will can wait. I ain't going to die just yet—not if Iknow anything. But although I think you'd look a heap better and moreresponsible if you wore some hair on your face, still in most things Ithink you're a man of sense. And you're not too young. That's why Ididn't send for Harry Wardrop; he's too young."

"I've been robbed," she announced in a half whisper, and straightened towatch the effect of her words.

"Indeed!" I said, properly thunderstruck. Iwas surprised. I hadalways believed that only the use of the fourth dimension in space wouldenable any one, not desired, to gain access to the Maitland house. "Ofmoney?"

"Not money, although I had a good bit in the house." This also I knew.It was said of Miss Letitia that when money came into her possession itwent out of circulation.

"When you had those pearls appraised for me at the jewelers last year,how many were there?"

"Exactly," she corroborated, in triumph. "They belonged to my mother.Margery's mother got some of them. That's a good many years ago, youngman. They are worth more than they were then—a great deal more."

"Twenty-two thousand dollars," I repeated. "You remember, Miss Letitia,that I protested vigorously at the time against your keeping them in thehouse."

Miss Letitia ignored this, but before she went on she repeated again hercat-like pouncing at the door, only to find the hall empty as before.This time when she sat down it was knee to knee with me.

"Yesterday morning," she said gravely, "I got down the box; they havealways been kept in the small safe in the top of my closet. When Janefound a picture of my niece, Margery Fleming, in Harry's room, I thoughtit likely there was some truth in the gossip Jane heard about the two,and—if there was going to be a wedding—why, the pearls were to go toMargery anyhow. But—I found the door of the safe unlocked and a littlebit open—and ten of the pearls were gone!"

"Gone!" I echoed. "Ten of them! Why, it's ridiculous! If ten, why notthe whole ninety-eight?"

"How do I know?" she replied with asperity. "That's what I keep a lawyerfor: that's why I sent for you."

"But you need a detective," I cried. "If you can find the thief I willbe glad to send him where he ought to be, but I couldn't find him."

"I will not have the police," she persisted inflexibly. "They will comearound asking impertinent questions, and telling the newspapers that afoolish old woman had got what she deserved."

"You have less sense than I thought," she snapped. "I am going to leavethem where they are, and watch. Whoever took the ten will be back formore, mark my words."

"I don't advise it," I said decidedly. "You have most of them now, andyou might easily lose them all; not only that, but it is not safe foryou or your sister."

"Stuff and nonsense!" the old lady said, with spirit. "As for Jane, shedoesn't even know they are gone. I know who did it. It was the newhousemaid, Bella MacKenzie. Nobody else could get in. I lock up thehouse myself at night, and I'm in the habit of doing a pretty thoroughjob of it. They went in the last three weeks, for I counted themSaturday three weeks ago myself. The only persons in the house in thattime, except ourselves, were Harry, Bella and Hepsibah, who's been herefor forty years and wouldn't know a pearl from a pickled onion."

"Then—what do you want me to do?" I asked. "Have Bella arrested and hertrunk searched?"

"Her trunk!" she said scornfully. "I turned it inside out this morning,pretending I thought she was stealing the laundry soap. Like as not shehas them buried in the vegetable garden. What I want you to do is tostay here for three or four nights, to be on hand. When I catch thethief, I want my lawyer right by."

It ended by my consenting, of course. Miss Letitia was seldom refused. Itelephoned to Fred that I would not be home, listened for voices anddecided Margery Fleming had gone to bed. Miss Jane lighted me to thedoor of the guest room, and saw that everything was comfortable. Herthin gray curls bobbed as she examined the water pitcher, saw to thetowels, and felt the bed linen for dampness. At the door she stopped andturned around timidly.

"Has—has anything happened to disturb my sister?" she asked. "She—hasbeen almost irritable all day."

"She is worried about her colored orphans," I evaded. "She does notapprove of fireworks for them on the fourth of July."

Miss Jane was satisfied. I watched her little, old, black-robed figurego lightly down the hall. Then I bolted the door, opened all thewindows, and proceeded to a surreptitious smoke.

CHAPTER IV

A THIEF IN THE NIGHT

The windows being wide open, it was not long before a great moth camewhirring in. He hurled himself at the light and then, dazzled andsinged, began to beat with noisy thumps against the barrier of theceiling. Finding no egress there, he was back at the lamp again,whirling in dizzy circles until at last, worn out, he dropped to thetable, where he lay on his back, kicking impotently.

The room began to fill with tiny winged creatures that flung themselvesheadlong to destruction, so I put out the light and sat down near thewindow, with my cigar and my thoughts.

Miss Letitia's troubles I dismissed shortly. While it was odd that onlyten pearls should have been taken, still—in every other way it bore themarks of an ordinary theft. The thief might have thought that by leavingthe majority of the gems he could postpone discovery indefinitely. Butthe Fleming case was of a different order. Taken by itself, Fleming'sdisappearance could have been easily accounted for. There must be timesin the lives of all unscrupulous individuals when they feel the need ofretiring temporarily from the public eye. But the intrusion into theFleming home, the ransacked desk and the broken money drawer—most ofall, the bit of paper with eleven twenty-two on it—here was a hurdle mylegal mind refused to take.

I had finished my second cigar, and was growing more and more wakeful,when I heard a footstep on the path around the house. It was blackoutside; when I looked out, as I did cautiously, I could not see eventhe gray-white of the cement walk. The steps had ceased, but there was asound of fumbling at one of the shutters below. The catch clicked twice,as if some thin instrument was being slipped underneath to raise it, andonce I caught a muttered exclamation.

I drew in my head and, puffing my cigar until it was glowing, managed byits light to see that it was a quarter to two. When I listened again,the house-breaker had moved to another window, and was shaking itcautiously.

With Miss Letitia's story of the pearls fresh in my mind, I felt at oncethat the thief, finding his ten a prize, had come back for more. Myfirst impulse was to go to the head of my bed, where I am accustomed tokeep a revolver. With the touch of the tall corner post, however, Iremembered that I was not at home, and that it was not likely there wasa weapon in the house.

Finally, after knocking over an ornament that shattered on the hearthand sounded like the crash of doom, I found on the mantel a heavy brasscandlestick, and with it in my hand I stepped into the gloom of thehallway and felt my way to the stairs.

There were no night lights; the darkness was total. I found the stairsbefore I expected to, and came within an ace of pitching down, headlong.I had kicked off my shoes—a fact which I regretted later. Once down thestairs I was on more familiar territory. I went at once into thelibrary, which was beneath my room, but the sounds at the window hadceased. I thought I heard steps on the walk, going toward the front ofthe house. I wheeled quickly and started for the door, when somethingstruck me a terrific blow on the nose. I reeled back and sat down, dizzyand shocked. It was only when no second blow followed the first that Irealized what had occurred.

With my two hands out before me in the blackness, I had groped, one handon either side of the open door, which of course I had struck violentlywith my nose. Afterward I found it had bled considerably, and my collarand tie must have added to my ghastly appearance.

My candlestick had rolled under the table, and after crawling around onmy hands and knees, I found it. I had lost, I suppose, three or fourminutes, and I was raging at my awkwardness and stupidity. No one,however, seemed to have heard the noise. For all her boastedwatchfulness, Miss Letitia must have been asleep. I got back into thehall and from there to the dining-room. Some one was fumbling at theshutters there, and as I looked they swung open. It was so dark outside,with the trees and the distance from the street, that only the creakingof the shutter told it had opened. I stood in the middle of the room,with one hand firmly clutching my candlestick.

But the window refused to move. The burglar seemed to have no propertools; he got something under the sash, but it snapped, and through theheavy plate-glass I could hear him swearing. Then he abruptly left thewindow and made for the front of the house.

I blundered in the same direction, my unshod feet striking on projectingfurniture and causing me agonies, even through my excitement. When Ireached the front door, however, I was amazed to find it unlocked, andstanding open perhaps an inch. I stopped uncertainly. I was in apeculiar position; not even the most ardent admirers of antique brasscandlesticks indorse them as weapons of offense or defense. But, thereseeming to be nothing else to do, I opened the door quietly and steppedout into the darkness.

The next instant I was flung heavily to the porch floor. I am not asmall man by any means, but under the fury of that onslaught I was achild. It was a porch chair, I think, that knocked me senseless; I knowI folded up like a jack-knife, and that was all I did know for a fewminutes.

When I came to I was lying where I had fallen, and a candle was burningbeside me on the porch floor. It took me a minute to remember, andanother minute to realize that I was looking into the barrel of arevolver. It occurred to me that I had never seen a more villainous facethan that of the man who held it—which shows my state of mind—and thatmy position was the reverse of comfortable. Then the man behind the gunspoke.

"What bag?" I inquired feebly. My head was jumping, and the candle was avolcanic eruption of sparks and smoke.

"Don't be a fool," the gentleman with the revolver persisted. "If Idon't get that bag within five minutes, I'll fill you as full of holesas a cheese."

"I haven't seen any bag," I said stupidly. "What sort of bag?" I heardmy own voice, drunk from the shock. "Paper bag, laundry bag—"

"You've hidden it in the house," he said, bringing the revolver a littlecloser with every word. My senses came back with a jerk and I struggledto free myself.

"Go in and look," I responded. "Let me up from here, and I'll take youin myself."

"You'll take me in! You!" He got up without changing the menacingposition of the gun. "You walk in there—here, carry the candle—andtake me to that bag. Quick, do you hear?"

I was too bewildered to struggle. I got up dizzily, but when I tried tostoop for the candle I almost fell on it. My head cleared after amoment, and when I had picked up the candle I had a good chance to lookat my assailant. He was staring at me, too. He was a young fellow, welldressed, and haggard beyond belief.

"I don't know anything about a bag," I persisted, "but if you will giveme your word there was nothing in it belonging to this house, I willtake you in and let you look for it."

"My name is Knox," I said coolly, feeling for my handkerchief—my headwas bleeding from a cut over the ear—"John Knox."

"Knox!" Instead of showing relief; his manner showed greaterconsternation than ever. He snatched the candle from me and, holding itup, searched my face. "Then—good God—where is my traveling-bag?"

"I am Harry Wardrop," he said, "and I have been robbed, Mr. Knox. I wastrying to get in the house without waking the family, and when I cameback here to the front door, where I had left my valise, it was gone. Ithought you were the thief when you came out, and—we've lost all thistime. Somebody has followed me and robbed me!"

"What was in the bag?" I asked, stepping to the edge of the porch andlooking around, with the help of the candle.

"Valuable papers," he said shortly. He seemed to be dazed and at a losswhat to do next. We had both instinctively kept our voices low.

"You are certain you left it here?" I asked. The thing seemed incrediblein the quiet and peace of that neighborhood.

Once more I began a desultory search, going down the steps and lookingamong the cannas that bordered the porch. Something glistened beside thestep, and stooping down I discovered a small brown leathertraveling-bag, apparently quite new.

"Here it is," I said, not so gracious as I might have been; I hadsuffered considerably for that traveling-bag. The sight of it restoredWardrop's poise at once. His twitching features relaxed.

"By Jove, I'm glad to see it," he said. "I can't explain,but—tremendous things were depending on that bag, Mr. Knox. I don'tknow how to apologize to you; I must have nearly brained you."

"You did," I said grimly, and gave him the bag. The moment he took it Iknew there was something wrong; he hurried into the house and lightedthe library lamp. Then he opened the traveling-bag with shaking fingers.It was empty!

He stood for a moment, staring incredulously into it. Then he hurled itdown on the table and turned on me, as I stood beside him.

"It's a trick!" he said furiously. "You've hidden it somewhere. This isnot my bag. You've substituted one just like it."

"Don't be a fool," I retorted. "How could I substitute an empty satchelfor yours when up to fifteen minutes ago I had never seen you or yourgrip either? Use a little common sense. Some place to-night you have putdown that bag, and some clever thief has substituted a similar one. It'san old trick."

"It's impossible," he said after a pause, while he seemed to be goingover, minute by minute, the events of the night. "I was followed, asfar as that goes, in Plattsburg. Two men watched me from the minuteI got there, on Tuesday; I changed my hotel, and for all ofyesterday—Wednesday, that is—I felt secure enough. But on my way tothe train I felt that I was under surveillance again, and by turningquickly I came face to face with one of the men."

"Yes. I thought he was a detective, you know I've had a lot of that sortof thing lately, with election coming on. He didn't get on the train,however."

"Yes, the other one may. The thing I don't understand is this, Mr. Knox.When we drew in at Bellwood Station I distinctly remember opening thebag and putting my newspaper and railroad schedule inside. It was theright bag then; my clothing was in it, and my brushes."

"It is here," I said, drawing out the yellow folder. For a moment mycompanion looked almost haunted. He pressed his hands to his head andbegan to pace the room like a crazy man.

"The whole thing is impossible. I tell you, that valise was heavy when Iwalked up from the station. I changed it from one hand to the otherbecause of the weight. When I got here I set it down on the edge of theporch and tried the door. When I found it locked—"

"But it wasn't locked," I broke in. "When I came down-stairs to look fora burglar, I found it open at least an inch."

"We're both crazy, then," he asserted gravely. "I tell you, I triedevery way I knew to unlock that door, and could hear the chain rattling.Unlocked! You don't know the way this house is fastened up at night."

We were so engrossed that neither of us had heard steps on the stairs.The sound of a smothered exclamation from the doorway caused us both toturn suddenly. Standing there, in a loose gown of some sort, very muchsurprised and startled, was Margery Fleming. Wardrop pulled himselftogether at once. As for me, I knew what sort of figure I cut, my collarstained with blood, a lump on my forehead that felt as big as adoor-knob, and no shoes.

"Whatis the matter?" she asked uncertainly. "I heard such queernoises, and I thought some one had broken into the house."

"Mr. Wardrop was trying to break in," I explained, "and I heard him andcame down. On the way I had a bloody encounter with an open door, inwhich I came out the loser."

I don't think she quite believed me. She looked from my swollen head tothe open bag, and then to Wardrop's pale face. Then I think, woman-like,she remembered the two great braids that hung over her shoulders andthe dressing-gown she wore, for she backed precipitately into the hall.

"I'm glad that's all it is," she called back cautiously, and we couldhear her running up the stairs.

"You'd better go to bed," Wardrop said, picking up his hat. "I'm goingdown to the station. There's no train out of here between midnight and aflag train at four-thirtyA. M. It's not likely to be of any use, but Iwant to see who goes on that train."

"It is only half past two," I said, glancing at my watch. "We might lookaround outside first."

The necessity for action made him welcome any suggestion. Reticent as hewas, his feverish excitement made me think that something vital hung onthe recovery of the contents of that Russia leather bag. We found alantern somewhere in the back of the house, and together we went overthe grounds. It did not take long, and we found nothing.

As I look back on that night, the key to what had passed and to muchthat was coming was so simple, so direct—and yet we missed it entirely.Nor, when bigger things developed, and Hunter's trained senses werebrought into play, did he do much better. It was some time before welearned the true inwardness of the events of that night.

At five o'clock in the morning Wardrop came back exhausted andnerveless. No one had taken the four-thirty; the contents of the bagwere gone, probably beyond recall. I put my dented candlestick back onthe mantel, and prepared for a little sleep, blessing the deafness ofold age which had enabled the Maitland ladies to sleep through it all. Itried to forget the queer events of the night, but the throbbing of myhead kept me awake, and through it all one question obtruded itself—whohad unlocked the front door and left it open?

CHAPTER V

LITTLE MISS JANE

I was almost unrecognizable when I looked at myself in the mirror thenext morning, preparatory to dressing for breakfast. My nose boasted anew arch, like the back of an angry cat, making my profile Roman andferocious, and the lump on my forehead from the chair was swollen,glassy and purple. I turned my back to the mirror and dressed inwrathful irritation and my yesterday's linen.

Miss Fleming was in the breakfast-room when I got down, standing at awindow, her back to me. I have carried with me, during all the monthssince that time, a mental picture of her as she stood there, in a pinkmorning frock of some sort. But only the other day, having mentionedthis to her, she assured me that the frock was blue, that she didn'thave a pink garment at the time this story opens and that if she did shepositively didn't have it on. And having thus flouted my eye for color,she maintains that she didnot have her back to me, for shedistinctly saw my newly-raised bridge as I came down the stairs. So Iamend this. Miss Fleming in a blue frock was facing the door when I wentinto the breakfast-room. Of one thing I am certain. She came forward andheld out her hand.

"It isn't mine," I replied meekly. "My own face is beneath theseexcrescences. I tried to cover the bump on my forehead with Frenchchalk, but it only accentuated the thing, like snow on a mountain top."

"'The purple peaks of Darien,'" she quoted, pouring me my coffee. "Doyou know, I feel so much better since you have taken hold of things.Aunt Letitia thinks you are wonderful."

I thought ruefully of the failure of my first attempt to play thesleuth, and I disclaimed any right to Miss Letitia's high opinion of me.From my dogging the watchman to the police station, to Delia and hernote, was a short mental step.

"Before any one comes down, Miss Fleming," I said, "I want to ask aquestion or two. What was the name of the maid who helped you searchthe house that night?"

"What does one know about new servants?" she responded. "They bring youreferences, but references are the price most women pay to get rid oftheir servants without a fuss. Rose was fat and old, but Delia waspretty. I thought she rather liked Carter."

Wardrop came in then, and we spoke of other things. The two elderlyladies it seemed had tea and toast in their rooms when they wakened, andthe three of us breakfasted together. But conversation languished withWardrop's appearance; he looked haggard and worn, avoided MissFleming's eyes, and after ordering eggs instead of his chop, looked athis watch and left without touching anything.

"I want to get the nine-thirty, Margie," he said, coming back with hishat in his hand. "I may not be out to dinner. Tell Miss Letitia, willyou?" He turned to go, but on second thought came back to me and heldout his hand.

"Not if I see you first," I interrupted. He glanced at my mutilatedfeatures and smiled.

"I have made you a Maitland," he said. "I didn't think that anything buta prodigal Nature could duplicate Miss Letitia's nose! I'm honestlysorry, Mr. Knox, and if you do not want Miss Jane at that bump with acold silver knife and some butter, you'd better duck before she comesdown. Good-by, Margie."

I think the girl was as much baffled as I was by the change in hismanner when he spoke to her. His smile faded and he hardly met her eyes:I thought that his aloofness puzzled rather than hurt her. When thehouse door had closed behind him, she dropped her chin in her hand andlooked across the table.

"You did not tell me the truth last night, Mr. Knox," she said. "I havenever seen Harry look like that. Something has happened to him."

"He was robbed of his traveling-bag," I explained, on Fred's theory thathalf a truth is better than a poor lie. "It's a humiliating experience,I believe. A man will throw away thousands, or gamble them away, withmore equanimity than he'll see some one making off with his hair brushesor his clean collars."

"His traveling-bag!" she repeated scornfully. "Mr. Knox, something hashappened to my father, and you and Harry are hiding it from me."

"On my honor, it is nothing of the sort," I hastened to assure her. "Isaw him for only a few minutes, just long enough for him to wreck myappearance."

She got up and crossing to the wooden mantel, put her arms upon it andleaned her head against them. "I wanted to ask him," she said drearily,"but I am afraid to. Suppose he doesn't know and I should tell him! Hewould go to Mr. Schwartz at once, and Mr. Schwartz is treacherous. Thepapers would get it, too."

Her eyes filled with tears, and I felt as awkward as a man always doeswhen a woman begins to cry. If he knows her well enough he can go overand pat her on the shoulder and assure her it is going to be all right.If he does not know her, and there are two maiden aunts likely to comein at any minute, he sits still, as I did, and waits until the stormclears.

"I didn't sleep much," she explained, dabbing at her eyes, "and I amnervous, anyhow. Mr. Knox, are you sure it was only Harry trying to getinto the house last night?"

"Only Harry," I repeated. "If Mr. Wardrop's attempt to get into thehouse leaves me in this condition, what would a real burglar have doneto me!"

"There was some one moving about up-stairs not long before I came down,"she said slowly.

"Very well," triumphantly. "Some one did. Not only that, but they werein the store-room on the floor above. I could hear one person andperhaps two, going from one side of the room to the other and backagain."

"You heard a goblin quadrille. First couple forward and back," I saidfacetiously.

"I heard real footsteps—unmistakable ones. The maids sleep back on thesecond floor, and—don't tell me it was rats. There are no rats in myAunt Letitia's house."

I was more impressed than I cared to show. I found I had a half hourbefore train time, and as we were neither of us eating anything, Isuggested that we explore the upper floor of the house. I did it, Iexplained, not because I expected to find anything, but because I wassure we would not.

We crept past the two closed doors behind which the ladies Maitland werepresumably taking out their crimps and taking in their tea. Then up anarrow, obtrusively clean stairway to the upper floor.

It was an old-fashioned, sloping-roofed attic, with narrow windows and abare floor. At one end a door opened into a large room, and in therewere the family trunks of four generations of Maitlands. One on anotherthey were all piled there—little hair trunks, squab-topped trunks, hugeSaratogas—of the period when the two maiden ladies were in their lateteens—and there were handsome, modern trunks, too. For Miss Fleming'ssatisfaction I made an examination of the room, but it showed nothing.There was little or no dust to have been disturbed; the windows wereclosed and locked.

In the main attic were two step-ladders, some curtains drying on framesand an old chest of drawers with glass knobs and the veneering broken inplaces. One of the drawers stood open, and inside could be seen a redand white patchwork quilt, and a grayish thing that looked like flanneland smelled to heaven of camphor. We gave up finally, and started down.

Part way down the attic stairs Margery stopped, her eyes fixed on thewhite-scrubbed rail. Following her gaze, I stopped, too, and I felt asort of chill go over me. No spot or blemish, no dirty finger printmarked the whiteness of that stair rail, except in one place. On it,clear and distinct, every line of the palm showing, was the reddishimprint of a hand!

Margery did not speak; she had turned very white, and closed her eyes,but she was not faint. When the first revulsion had passed, I reachedover and touched the stain. It was quite dry, of course, but it wasstill reddish-brown; another hour or two would see it black. It wasevidently fresh—Hunter said afterward it must have been about six hoursold, and as things transpired, he was right. The stain showed a handsomewhat short and broad, with widened finger-tips; marked in ink, itwould not have struck me so forcibly, perhaps, but there, its ugly redagainst the white wood, it seemed to me to be the imprint of a brutal,murderous hand.

"What did I tell you?" she asked. "Some one was in this house lastnight; I heard them distinctly. There must have been two, and theyquarreled—" she shuddered.

We went on down-stairs into the quiet and peace of the dining-roomagain. I got some hot coffee for Margery, for she looked shaken, andfound I had missed my train.

"I am beginning to think I am being pursued by a malicious spirit," shesaid, trying to smile. "I came away from home because people got intothe house at night and left queer signs of their visits, and now, hereat Bellwood, where nothingever happens, the moment I arrive thingsbegin to occur. And—just as it was at home—the house was so welllocked last night."

I did not tell her of the open hall door, just as I had kept from herthe fact that only the contents of Harry Wardrop's bag had been taken.That it had all been the work of one person, and that that person,having in some way access to the house, had also stolen the pearls, wasnow my confident belief.

I looked at Bella—the maid—as she moved around the dining-room; herstolid face was not even intelligent; certainly not cunning. Heppie,the cook and only other servant, was partly blind and her horizon wasthe diameter of her largest kettle. No—it had not been a servant, thismysterious intruder who passed the Maitland silver on the sideboardwithout an attempt to take it, and who floundered around an attic atnight, in search of nothing more valuable than patchwork quilts andwinter flannels. It is strange to look back and think how quietly we satthere; that we could see nothing but burglary—or an attempt at it—inwhat we had found.

It must have been after nine o'clock when Bella came running into theroom. Ordinarily a slow and clumsy creature, she almost flew. She had atray in her hand, and the dishes were rattling and threatening overthrowat every step. She brought up against a chair, and a cup went flying.The breaking of a cup must have been a serious offense in Miss LetitiaMaitland's house, but Bella took no notice whatever of it.

"Nonsense!" I said, seeing Margery's horrified face. "Don't come in herewith such a story. If Miss Jane is not in her room, she is somewhereelse, that's all."

Bella stooped and gathered up the broken cup, her lips moving. Margeryhad recovered herself. She made Bella straighten and explain.

"Do you mean—she is not in her room?" she asked incredulously. "Isn'tshe somewhere around the house?"

"Go up and look at the room," the girl replied, and, with Margeryleading, we ran up the stairs.

Miss Jane's room was empty. From somewhere near Miss Letitia could beheard lecturing Hepsibah about putting too much butter on the toast. Herhigh voice, pitched for Heppie's old ears, rasped me. Margery closed thedoor, and we surveyed the room together.

The bed had been occupied; its coverings had been thrown back, as ifits occupant had risen hurriedly. The room itself was in a state ofconfusion; a rocker lay on its side, and Miss Jane's clothing, folded asshe had taken it off, had slid off on to the floor. Her shoes stoodneatly at the foot of the bed, and a bottle of toilet vinegar had beenupset, pouring a stream over the marble top of the dresser and down onto the floor. Over the high wooden mantel the Maitland who had beengovernor of the state years ago hung at a waggish angle, and a clock hadbeen pushed aside and stopped at half-past one.

Margery stared around her in bewilderment. Of course, it was not untillater in the day that I saw all the details. My first impression was ofconfusion and disorder: the room seemed to have been the scene of astruggle. The overturned furniture, the clothes on the floor, thepicture, coupled with the print of the hand on the staircase and MissJane's disappearance, all seemed to point to one thing.

And as if to prove it conclusively, Margery picked up Miss Jane's newlace cap from the floor. It was crumpled and spotted with blood.

"She has been killed," Margery said, in a choking voice. "Killed, andshe had not an enemy in the world!"

Margery had more presence of mind than I had; I suppose it is becausewoman's courage is mental and man's physical, that in times of greatstrain women always make the better showing. While I was standing in themiddle of the room, staring at the confusion around me, Margery wasalready on her knees, looking under the high, four-post bed. Findingnothing there she went to the closet. It was undisturbed. Pathetic rowsof limp black dresses and on the shelves two black crepe bonnets weremute reminders of the little old lady. But there was nothing else in theroom.

"Call Robert, the gardener," Margery said quickly, "and have him helpyou search the grounds and cellars. I will take Bella and go through thehouse. Above everything, keep it from Aunt Letitia as long as possible."

I locked the door into the disordered room, and with my head whirling, Iwent to look for Robert.

It takes a short time to search an acre of lawn and shrubbery. There wasno trace of the missing woman anywhere outside the house, and fromBella, as she sat at the foot of the front stairs with her apron overher head, I learned in a monosyllable that nothing had been found in thehouse. Margery was with Miss Letitia, and from the excited conversationI knew she was telling her—not harrowing details, but that Miss Janehad disappeared during the night.

"Look in the fruit closet in the store-room," I heard her say. "She'slet the spring lock shut on her twice; she was black in the face thelast time we found her."

"Then she's out looking for stump water to take that wart off her neck.She said yesterday she was going for some."

"But her clothes are all here," Margery persisted. "We think some onemust have got in the house."

"If all her clothes are there she's been sleep-walking," Miss Letitiasaid calmly. "We used to have to tie her by a cord around her ankle andfasten it to the bedpost. When she tried to get up the cord would pulland wake her."

I think after a time, however, some of Margery's uneasiness communicateditself to the older woman. She finished dressing, and fumed when we toldher we had locked Miss Jane's door and mislaid the key. Finally, Margerygot her settled in the back parlor with some peppermints and herknitting; she had a feeling, she said, that Jane had gone after thestump water and lost her way, and I told Margery to keep her in thatstate of mind as long as she could.

I sent for Hunter that morning and he came at three o'clock. I took himthrough the back entrance to avoid Miss Letitia. I think he had beenskeptical until I threw open the door and showed him the upset chair,the old lady's clothing, and the bloodstained lace cap. His examinationwas quick and thorough. He took a crumpled sheet of note paper out ofthe waste-basket and looked at it, then he stuffed it in his pocket. Hesniffed the toilet water, called Margery and asked her if any clothingwas missing, and on receiving a negative answer asked if any shawls orwraps were gone from the halls or other rooms. Margery reported nothingmissing.

Before he left the room, Hunter went back and moved the picture whichhad been disturbed over the mantel. What he saw made him get a chairand, standing on it, take the picture from its nail. Thus exposed, thewall showed an opening about a foot square, and perhaps eighteen inchesdeep. A metal door, opening in, was unfastened and ajar, and just insidewas a copy of a recent sentimental novel and a bottle of some sort ofcomplexion cream. In spite of myself, I smiled; it was so typical of thedear old lady, with the heart of a girl and a skin that was losing itsroses. But there was something else in the receptacle, something thatmade Margery Fleming draw in her breath sharply, and made Hunter raisehis eyebrows a little and glance at me. The something was a scrap ofunruled white paper, and on it the figures eleven twenty-two!

CHAPTER VI

A FOUNTAIN PEN

Harry Wardrop came back from the city at four o'clock, while Hunter wasin the midst of his investigation. I met him in the hall and told himwhat had happened, and with this new apprehension added to the shock ofthe night before, he looked as though his nerves were ready to snap.

Wardrop was a man of perhaps twenty-seven, as tall as I, although not soheavy, with direct blue eyes and fair hair; altogether a manly andprepossessing sort of fellow. I was not surprised that Margery Fleminghad found him attractive—he had the blond hair and off-hand manner thatwomen seem to like. I am dark, myself.

He seemed surprised to find Hunter there, and not particularly pleased,but he followed us to the upper floor and watched silently while Hunterwent over the two rooms. Beside the large chest of drawers in the mainattic Hunter found perhaps half a dozen drops of blood, and on the edgeof the open drawer there were traces of more. In the inner room twotrunks had been moved out nearly a foot, as he found by the faint dustthat had been under them. With the stain on the stair rail, that was allhe discovered, and it was little enough. Then he took out his note-bookand there among the trunks we had a little seance of our own, in whichHunter asked questions, and whoever could do so answered them.

"Have you a pencil or pen, Mr. Knox?" he asked me, but I had none.Wardrop felt his pockets, with no better success.

"I have lost my fountain pen somewhere around the house to-day," he saidirritably. "Here's a pencil—not much of one."

"About half-past one or perhaps a few minutes later. The clock strucktwo while I was still awake and nervous."

"This person who was walking through the attics here—would you say itwas a heavy person? A man, I mean?"

"Yes," she said finally. "It was very stealthy, but I think it was aman's step."

"There could have been no such sounds," I said. "I sat in my room andsmoked until a quarter to two. I heard nothing until then, when I heardMr. Wardrop trying to get into the house. I went down to admit him,and—I found the front door open about an inch."

"The last train gets in here at twelve-thirty," he said slowly. "Does italways take you an hour and a quarter to walk the three squares to thehouse?"

Wardrop flushed uneasily, and I could see Margery's eyes dilate withamazement. As for me, I could only stare.

"Then—will you be good enough to tell me where you did go?" he asked."I have reasons for wanting to know."

"Damn your reasons—I beg your pardon, Margery. Look here, Mr. Hunter,do you think I would hurt a hair of that old lady's head? Do you think Icame here last night and killed her, or whatever it is that has happenedto her? And then went out and tried to get in again through the window?"

"Not necessarily," Hunter said, unruffled. "It merely occurred to methat we have at least an hour of your time last night, while this thingwas going on, to account for. However, we can speak of that later. I ampractically certain of one thing, Miss Maitland is not dead, or was notdead when she was taken away from this house."

"Well, it is possible. It's a puzzling affair all through. You arecertain there are no closets or unused rooms where, if there had been amurder, the body could be concealed."

"I never heard of any," Margery said, but I saw Wardrop's face change onthe instant. He said nothing, however, but stood frowning at the floor,with his hands deep in his coat pockets.

Margery was beginning to show the effect of the long day's strain; shebegan to cry a little, and with an air of proprietorship that Iresented, somehow, Wardrop went over to her.

"You are going to lie down, Margery," he said, holding out his hand tohelp her up. "Mrs. Mellon will come over to Aunt Letitia, and you mustget some sleep."

"Sleep!" she said with scorn, as he helped her to her feet. "Sleep, whenthings like this are occurring! Father first, and now dear old AuntJane! Harry, do you know where my father is?"

"I know that he is all right, Margery. He has been—out of town. If ithad not been for something unforeseen that—happened within the last fewhours, he would have been home to-day."

"And Aunt Jane?" she asked Hunter, from the head of the attic stairs,"you do not think she is dead?"

"Not until we have found something more," he answered tactlessly. "It'slike where there's smoke there's fire; where there's murder there's abody."

When they had both gone, Hunter sat down on a trunk and drew out a cigarthat looked like a bomb.

"I'll be damned if I know," he responded, looking around for some placeto expectorate and finding none.

"The window," I suggested, and he went over to it. When he came back hehad a rather peculiar expression. He sat down and puffed for a moment.

"In the first place," he began, "we can take it for granted that, unlessshe was crazy or sleep-walking, she didn't go out in her night-clothes,and there's nothing of hers missing. She wasn't taken in a carriage,providing she was taken at all. There's not a mark of wheels on thatdrive newer than a week, and besides, you say you heard nothing."

"Then, unless she went away in a balloon, where it wouldn't matter whatshe had on, she is still around the premises. It depends on how badlyshe was hurt."

"Are you sure it was she who was hurt?" I asked. "That print of ahand—that is not Miss Jane's."

In reply Hunter led the way down the stairs to the place where the stainon the stair rail stood out, ugly and distinct. He put his own heavyhand on the rail just below it.

"Suppose," he said, "suppose you grip something very hard, what happensto your hand?"

"Now, look at that stain. Look at the short fingers—why, it's a child'shand beside mine. The breadth is from pressure. It might be figured outthis way. The fingers, you notice, point down the stairs. In some way,let us say, the burglar, for want of a better name, gets into the house.He used a ladder resting against that window by the chest of drawers."

"Yes, there is a pruning ladder there. Now then—he comes down thesestairs, and he has a definite object. He knows of something valuable inthat cubby hole over the mantel in Miss Jane's room. How does he get in?The door into the upper hall is closed and bolted, but the door into thebath-room is open. From there another door leads into the bedroom, andit has no bolt—only a key. That kind of a lock is only a three-minutesdelay, or less. Now then, Miss Maitland was a light sleeper. When shewakened she was too alarmed to scream; she tried to get to the door andwas intercepted. Finally she got out the way the intruder got in, andran along the hall. Every door was locked. In a frenzy she ran up theattic stairs and was captured up there. Which bears out Miss Margery'sstory of the footsteps back and forward."

"Good heavens, what an awful thing!" I gasped. "And I was sittingsmoking just across the hall."

"He brings her down the stairs again, probably half dragging her. Once,she catches hold of the stair rail, and holds desperately to it, leavingthe stain here."

"But why did he bring her down?" I asked bewildered. "Why wouldn't hetake what he was after and get away?"

"She probably had to get the key of the iron door," he suggested. "Itwas hidden, and time was valuable. If there was a scapegrace member ofthe family, for instance, who knew where the old lady kept money, andwho needed it badly; who knew all about the house, and who—"

"Or even our young friend, Wardrop," Hunter said quietly. "He has anhour to account for. The trying to get in may have been a blind, and howdo you know that what he says was stolen out of his satchel was not whathe had just got from the iron box over the mantel in Miss Maitland'sroom?"

I was dizzy with trying to follow Hunter's facile imagination. The thingwe were trying to do was to find the old lady, and, after all, here webrought up against the sameimpasse.

"Then where is she now?" I asked. He meditated. He had sat down on thenarrow stairs, and was rubbing his chin with a thoughtful forefinger."One-thirty, Miss Margery says, when she heard the noise. One-forty-fivewhen you heard Wardrop at the shutters. I tell you, Knox, it is one oftwo things: either that woman is dead somewhere in this house, or sheran out of the hall door just before you went down-stairs, and in thatcase the Lord only knows where she is. If there is a room anywhere thatwe have not explored—"

"I am inclined to think there is," I broke in, thinking of Wardrop'sface a few minutes before. And just then Wardrop himself joined us. Heclosed the door at the foot of the boxed-in staircase, and came quietlyup.

"You spoke about an unused room or a secret closet, Mr. Hunter," hesaid, without any resentment in his tone. "We have nothing sosensational as that, but the old house is full of queer nooks andcrannies, and perhaps, in one of them, we might find—" he stopped andgulped. Whatever Hunter might think, whatever I might have against HarryWardrop, I determined then that he had had absolutely nothing to do withlittle Miss Maitland's strange disappearance.

The first place we explored was a closed and walled-in wine-cellar, longunused, and to which access was gained by a small window in the stonefoundation of the house. The cobwebs over the window made it practicallyan impossible place, but we put Robert, the gardener, through it, inspite of his protests.

"There's nothin' there, I tell you," he protested, with one leg over thecoping. "God only knows what's down there, after all these years. I'vebeen livin' here with the Miss Maitlands for twenty year, and I ain'tnever been put to goin' down into cellars on the end of a rope."

He went, because we were three to his one, but he was up again in sixtyseconds, with the announcement that the place was as bare as the top ofhis head.

We moved every trunk in the store-room, although it would have been amoral impossibility for any one to have done it the night before withoutrousing the entire family, and were thus able to get to and open a largecloset, which proved to contain neatly tied and labeled packages ofreligious weeklies, beginning in the sixties.

The grounds had been gone over inch by inch, without affording any clue,and now the three of us faced one another. The day was almost gone, andwe were exactly where we started. Hunter had sent men through the townand the adjacent countryside, but no word had come from them. MissLetitia had at last succumbed to the suspense and had gone to bed, whereshe lay quietly enough, as is the way with the old, but so mild that shewas alarming.

At five o'clock Hawes called me up from the office and almost tearfullyimplored me to come back and attend to my business. When I said it wasimpossible, I could hear him groan as he hung up the receiver. Hawes isof the opinion that by keeping fresh magazines in my waiting-room and bypersuading me to the extravagance of Turkish rugs, that he has built mypractice to its present flourishing state. When I left the telephone,Hunter was preparing to go back to town and Wardrop was walking up anddown the hall. Suddenly Wardrop stopped his uneasy promenade and hailedthe detective on his way to the door.

"By George," he exclaimed, "I forgot to show you the closet under theattic stairs!"

We hurried up and Wardrop showed us the panel in the hall, which slid toone side when he pushed a bolt under the carpet. The blackness of thecloset was horrible in its suggestion to me. I stepped back whileHunter struck a match and looked in.

"Better not go in," Wardrop said. "It hasn't been used for years andit's black with dust. I found it myself and showed it to Miss Jane. Idon't believe Miss Letitia knows it is here."

"It hasn't been used for years!" reflected Hunter, looking around himcuriously. "I suppose it has been some time since you were in here, Mr.Wardrop?"

"Several years," Wardrop replied carelessly. "I used to keep contrabandhere in my college days, cigarettes and that sort of thing. I haven'tbeen in it since then."

Hunter took his foot off a small object that lay on the floor, andpicking it up, held it out to Wardrop, with a grim smile.

CHAPTER VII

CONCERNING MARGERY

When Hunter had finally gone at six o'clock, summoned to town on urgentbusiness, we were very nearly where we had been before he came. He couldonly give us theories, and after all, what we wanted was fact—and MissJane. Many things, however, that he had unearthed puzzled me.

Why had Wardrop lied about so small a matter as his fountain pen? Thecloset was empty: what object could he have had in saying he had notbeen in it for years? I found that my belief in his sincerity of thenight before was going. If he had been lying then, I owed him somethingfor a lump on my head that made it difficult for me to wear my hat.

It would have been easy enough for him to rob himself, and, if he had aneye for the theatrical, to work out just some such plot. It was evenpossible that he had hidden for a few hours in the secret closet thecontents of the Russia leather bag. But, whatever Wardrop might ormight not be, he gave me little chance to find out, for he left thehouse before Hunter did that afternoon, and it was later, and understrange circumstances, that I met him again.

Hunter had not told me what was on the paper he had picked out of thebasket in Miss Jane's room, and I knew he was as much puzzled as I atthe scrap in the little cupboard, with eleven twenty-two on it. Itoccurred to me that it might mean the twenty-second day of the eleventhmonth, perhaps something that had happened on some momentous,long-buried twenty-second of November. But this was May, and the findingof two slips bearing the same number was too unusual.

After Hunter left I went back to the closet under the upper stairs, andwith some difficulty got the panel open again. The space inside, perhapseight feet high at one end and four at the other, was empty. There was arow of hooks, as if at some time clothing had been hung there, and aflat shelf at one end, gray with dust.

I struck another match and examined the shelf. On its surface werenumerous scratchings in the dust layer, but at one end, marked out as ifdrawn on a blackboard, was a rectangular outline, apparently that of asmallish box, and fresh.

My match burned my fingers and I dropped it to the floor, where itexpired in a sickly blue flame. At the last, however, it diedheroically—like an old man to whom his last hours bring back some ofthe glory of his prime, burning brightly for a second and then fadinginto darkness. The last flash showed me, on the floor of the closet andwedged between two boards, a small white globule. It did not needanother match to tell me it was a pearl.

I dug it out carefully and took it to my room. In the daylight there Irecognized it as an unstrung pearl of fair size and considerable value.There could hardly be a doubt that I had stumbled on one of the stolengems; but a pearl was only a pearl to me, after all. I didn't feel anyof the inspirations which fiction detectives experience when they happenon an important clue.

I lit a cigar and put the pearl on the table in front of me. But noexplanation formed itself in the tobacco smoke. If Wardrop took thepearls, I kept repeating over and over, if Wardrop took the pearls, whotook Miss Jane?

I tried to forget the pearls, and to fathom the connection between MissMaitland's disappearance and the absence of her brother-in-law. Thescrap of paper, eleven twenty-two, must connect them, but how? A familyscandal? Dismissed on the instant. There could be nothing that wouldtouch the virginal remoteness of that little old lady. Insanity? Well,Miss Jane might have had a sudden aberration and wandered away, but thatwould leave Fleming out, and the paper dragged him in. A common enemy?

I smoked and considered for some time over this. An especially malignantfoe might rob, or even murder, but it was almost ludicrous to think ofhis carrying away by force Miss Jane's ninety pounds of austere flesh.The solution, had it not been for the blood-stains, might have been apeaceful one, leaving out the pearls, altogether, but later developmentsshowed that the pearls refused to be omitted. To my mind, however, atthat time, the issue seemed a double one. I believed that some one,perhaps Harry Wardrop, had stolen the pearls, hidden them in the secretcloset, and disposed of them later. I made a note to try to follow upthe missing pearls.

Then—I clung to the theory that Miss Maitland had been abducted and wasbeing held for ransom. If I could have found traces of a vehicle of anysort near the house, I would almost have considered my contentionproved. That any one could have entered the house, intimidated and evenslightly injured the old lady, and taken her quietly out the front door,while I sat smoking in my room with the window open, and Wardrop tryingthe shutters at the side of the house, seemed impossible. Yet there werethe stains, the confusion, the open front door to prove it.

But—and I stuck here—the abductor who would steal an old woman, andtake her out into the May night without any covering—not evenshoes—clad only in her night-clothes, would run an almost certain riskof losing his prize by pneumonia. For a second search had shown not anarticle of wearing apparel missing from the house. Even the cedarchests were undisturbed; not a blanket was gone.

Just before dinner I made a second round of the grounds, this timelooking for traces of wheels. I found none near-by, and it occurred tome that the boldest highwayman would hardly drive up to the door for hisbooty. When I had extended my search to cover the unpaved lane thatseparated the back of the Maitland place from its nearest neighbor, Iwas more fortunate.

The morning delivery wagons had made fresh trails, and at first Idespaired. I sauntered up the lane to the right, however, and about ahundred feet beyond the boundary hedge I found circular tracks, broadand deep, where an automobile had backed and turned. The lane wasseparated by high hedges of osage orange from the properties on eitherside, and each house in that neighborhood had a drive of its own, whichentered from the main street, circled the house and went out as it came.

There was no reason, or, so far as I could see, no legitimate reason,why a car should have stopped there, yet it had stopped and for sometime. Deeper tracks in the sand at the side of the lane showed that.

I felt that I had made some progress: I had found where the pearls hadbeen hidden after the theft, and this put Bella out of the question. AndI had found—or thought I had—the way in which Miss Jane had been takenaway from Bellwood.

I came back past the long rear wing of the house which contained, Ipresumed, the kitchen and the other mysterious regions which only womenand architects comprehend. A long porch ran the length of the wing, andas I passed I heard my name called.

"In here in the old laundry," Margery's voice repeated, and I retracedmy steps and went up on the porch. At the very end of the wing,dismantled, piled at the sides with firewood and broken furniture, wasan old laundry. Its tubs were rusty, its walls mildewed and streaked,and it exhaled the musty odor of empty houses. On the floor in themiddle of the room, undeniably dirty and dishevelled, sat MargeryFleming.

"I thought you were never coming," she said petulantly. "I have beenhere alone for an hour."

"I'm sure I never guessed it," I apologized. "I should have been onlytoo glad to come and sit with you."

She was fumbling with her hair, which threatened to come down anyminute, and which hung, loosely knotted, over one small ear.

"I hate to look ridiculous," she said sharply, "and I detest beinglaughed at. I've been crying, and I haven't any handkerchief."

I proffered mine gravely, and she took it. She wiped the dusty streaksoff her cheeks and pinned her hair in a funny knob on top of her headthat would have made any other woman look like a caricature. But stillshe sat on the floor.

"Now," she said, when she had jabbed the last hair-pin into place andtucked my handkerchief into her belt, "if you have been sufficientlyamused, perhaps you will help me out of here."

In reply she brushed aside her gown, and for the first time I saw whathad occurred. She was sitting half over a trap-door in the floor, whichhad closed on her skirts and held her fast.

"The wretched thing!" she wailed. "And I have called until I am hoarse.I could shake Heppie! Then I tried to call you mentally. I fixed my mindon you and said over and over, 'Come, please come.' Didn't you feelanything at all?"

"Good old trap-door!" I said. "I know I was thinking about you, but Inever suspected the reason. And then to have walked past here twentyminutes ago! Why didn't you call me then?" I was tugging at the door,but it was fast, with the skirts to hold it tight.

"I was sure Robert had not looked carefully in the old wine cellar," shesaid, "and then I remembered this trap-door opened into it. It was theonly place we hadn't explored thoroughly. I put a ladder down andlooked around. Ugh!"

"Nothing—only I know now where Aunt Letitia's Edwin Booth went to. Hewas a cat," she explained, "and Aunt Letitia made the railroad pay forkilling him."

"Couldn't you—er—get out of your garments, and—I could go out andclose the door," I suggested delicately. "You see you are sitting on thetrap-door, and—"

But Margery scouted the suggestion with the proper scorn, and demanded apair of scissors. She cut herself loose with vicious snips, while Iparaphrased the old nursery rhyme, "She cut her petticoats all aroundabout." Then she gathered up her outraged garments and fledprecipitately.

She was unusually dignified at dinner. Neither of us cared to eat, andthe empty places—Wardrop's and Miss Letitia's—Miss Jane's had not beenset—were like skeletons at the board.

It was Margery who, after our pretense of a meal, voiced the suspicion Ithink we both felt.

"It is a strange time for Harry to go away," she said quietly, from thelibrary window.

"Why don't you say it?" she said suddenly, turning on me. "I know whatyou think. You believe he only pretended he was robbed!"

"I should be sorry to think anything of the kind," I began. But she didnot allow me to finish.

"I saw what you thought," she burst out bitterly. "The detective almostlaughed in his face. Oh, you needn't think I don't know: I saw him lastnight, and the woman too. He brought her right to the gate. You treat melike a child, all of you!"

In sheer amazement I was silent. So a new character had been introducedinto the play—a woman, too!

"You were not the only person, Mr. Knox, who could not sleep lastnight," she went on. "Oh, I know a great many things. I know about thepearls, and what you think about them, and I know more than that, I—"

She stopped then. She had said more than she intended to, and all atonce her bravado left her, and she looked like a frightened child. Iwent over to her and took one trembling hand.

"I wish you didn't know all those things," I said. "But since you do,won't you let me share the burden? The only reason I am still hereis—on your account."

I had a sort of crazy desire to take her in my arms and comfort her,Wardrop or no Wardrop. But at that moment, luckily for me, perhaps, MissLetitia's shrill old voice came from the stairway.

"Get out of my way, Heppie," she was saying tartly. "I'm not on mydeath-bed yet, not if I know it. Where's Knox?"

"I think I know where Jane is," she said, putting down her cane with ajerk. "I don't know why I didn't think about it before. She's gone toget her new teeth; she's been talkin' of it for a month. Not but whather old teeth would have done well enough."

"She would hardly go in the middle of the night," I returned. "She was avery timid woman, wasn't she?"

"She wasn't raised right," Miss Letitia said with a shake of her head."She's the baby, and the youngest's always spoiled."

"Have you thought that this might be more than it appears to be?" I wasfeeling my way: she was a very old woman. "It—for instance, it might beabduction, kidnapping—for a ransom."

"Ransom!" Miss Letitia snapped. "Mr. Knox, my father made his money byworking hard for it: I haven't wasted it—not that I know of. And ifJane Maitland was fool enough to be abducted, she'll stay a while beforeI pay anything for her. It looks to me as if this detective business wasgoing to be expensive, anyhow."

My excuse for dwelling with such attention to detail on the preliminarystory, the disappearance of Miss Jane Maitland and the peculiarcircumstances surrounding it, will have to find its justification in theevents that followed it. Miss Jane herself, and the solution of thatmystery, solved the even more tragic one in which we were about to beinvolved. I saywe, because it was borne in on me at about that time,that the things that concerned Margery Fleming must concern mehenceforth, whether I willed it so or otherwise. For the first time inmy life a woman's step on the stair was like no other sound in theworld.

CHAPTER VIII

TOO LATE

At nine o'clock that night things remained about the same. The manHunter had sent to investigate the neighborhood and the country justoutside of the town, came to the house about eight, and reported"nothing discovered." Miss Letitia went to bed early, and Margery tookher up-stairs.

"Not yet; there may be. Take a cab at the station and come to the cornerof Mulberry Street and Park Lane. You'd better dismiss your cab thereand wait for me."

I sent word up-stairs by Bella, who was sitting in the kitchen, herheavy face sodden with grief, and taking my hat and raincoat—it wasraining a light spring drizzle—I hurried to the station. Intwenty-four minutes I was in the city, and perhaps twelve minutes moresaw me at the designated corner, with my cab driving away and the raindropping off the rim of my hat and splashing on my shoulders.

I found a sort of refuge by standing under the wooden arch of a gate,and it occurred to me that, for all my years in the city, thisparticular neighborhood was altogether strange to me. Two blocks away,in any direction, I would have been in familiar territory again.

Back of me a warehouse lifted six or seven gloomy stories to the sky.The gate I stood in was evidently the entrance to its yard, and in fact,some uncomfortable movement of mine just then struck the latch, andalmost precipitated me backward by its sudden opening. Beyond was a yardfull of shadowy wheels and packing cases; the street lights did notpenetrate there, and with an uneasy feeling that almost anything, inthis none too savory neighborhood, might be waiting there, I struck amatch and looked at my watch. It was twenty minutes after ten. Once aman turned the corner and came toward me, his head down, his longulster flapping around his legs. Confident that it was Hunter, I steppedout and touched him on the arm. He wheeled instantly, and in the lightwhich shone on his face, I saw my error.

He went on again without speaking, only pulling his soft hat down lowerover his face. I looked after him until he turned the next corner, and Iknew I had not been mistaken; it was Wardrop.

The next minute Hunter appeared, from the same direction, and we walkedquickly together. I told him who the man just ahead had been, and henodded without surprise. But before we turned the next corner hestopped.

"I'm a member of it," he went on rapidly. "It's run by the city ring, orrather it runs itself. Be a good fellow while you're there, and keepyour eyes open. It's a queer joint."

The corner we turned found us on a narrow, badly paved street. Thebroken windows of the warehouse still looked down on us, and across thestreet was an ice factory, with two deserted wagons standing along thecurb. As well as I could see for the darkness, a lumber yard stretchedbeyond the warehouse, its piles of boards giving off in the rain thearomatic odor of fresh pine.

At a gate in the fence beyond the warehouse Hunter stopped. It was anordinary wooden gate and it opened with a thumb latch. Beyond stretcheda long, narrow, brick-paved alleyway, perhaps three feet wide, andlighted by the merest glimmer of a light ahead. Hunter went onregardless of puddles in the brick paving, and I stumbled after him. Aswe advanced, I could see that the light was a single electric bulb, hungover a second gate. While Hunter fumbled for a key in his pocket, I hadtime to see that this gate had a Yale lock, was provided, at the side,with an electric bell button, and had a letter slot cut in it.

Hunter opened the gate and preceded me through it. The gate swung to andclicked behind me. After the gloom of the passageway, the smallbrick-paved yard seemed brilliant with lights. Two wires were strungits length, dotted with many electric lamps. In a corner a striped tentstood out in grotesque relief; it seemed to be empty, and the weatherwas an easy explanation. From the two-story house beyond there camesuddenly a burst of piano music and a none too steady masculine voice.Hunter turned to me, with his foot on the wooden steps.

"Above everything else," he warned, "keep your temper. Nobody gives ahang in here whether you're the mayor of the town, the championpool-player of the first ward, or the roundsman on the beat."

The door at the top of the steps was also Yale-locked. We stepped atonce into the kitchen, from which I imagined that the house faced onanother street, and that for obvious reasons only its rear entrance wasused. The kitchen was bright and clean; it was littered, however, withhalf-cut loaves of bread, glasses and empty bottles. Over the range aman in his shirt sleeves was giving his whole attention to a slice ofham, sizzling on a skillet, and at a table near-by a young fellow, withhis hair cut in a barber's oval over the back of his neck, wasspreading slices of bread and cheese with mustard.

"How are you, Mr. Mayor?" Hunter said, as he shed his raincoat. "This isMr. Knox, the man who's engineering theStar-Eagle fight."

"The Cat is purring a welcome," he said, indicating the frying ham. "Ifmy cooking turns out right I'll ask you to have some ham with me. Idon't know why in thunder it gets black in the middle and won't cookaround the edges."

I recognized the mayor. He was a big fellow, handsome in a heavy way,and "Tommy" to every one who knew him. It seemed I was about to see mycity government at play.

Hunter was thoroughly at home. He took my coat and his own and hung themsomewhere to dry. Then he went into a sort of pantry opening off thekitchen and came out with four bottles of beer.

"We take care of ourselves here," he explained, as the newly barberedyouth washed some glasses. "If you want a sandwich, there is cooked hamin the refrigerator and cheese—if our friend at the sink has leftany."

The boy looked up from his glasses. "It's rat-trap cheese, that stuff,"he growled.

"The other ran out an hour ago and didn't come back," put in the mayor,grinning. "You can kill that with mustard, if it's too lively."

"Get some cigars, will you?" Hunter asked me. "They're on a shelf in thepantry. I have my hands full."

I went for the cigars, remembering to keep my eyes open. The pantry wasa small room: it contained an ice-box, stocked with drinkables, ham,eggs and butter. On shelves above were cards, cigars and liquors, andthere, too, I saw a box with an indorsement which showed the "honorsystem" of the Cat Club.

"Sign checks and drop here," it read, and I thought about the old adageof honor among thieves and politicians.

When I came out with the cigars Hunter was standing with a group of newarrivals; they included one of the city physicians, the director ofpublic charities and a judge of a local court. The latter, McFeely, alittle, thin Irishman, knew me and accosted me at once. The mayor wasbusy over the range, and was almost purple with heat and unwontedanxiety.

When the three new-comers went up-stairs, instead of going into thegrill-room, I looked at Hunter.

"Yes, if the political game is poker," he replied, and led the way intothe room which adjoined the kitchen.

No one paid any attention to us. Bare tables, a wooden floor, and almostas many cuspidors as chairs, comprised the furniture of the long room.In one corner was a battered upright piano, and there were twofireplaces with old-fashioned mantels. Perhaps a dozen men were sittingaround, talking loudly, with much scraping of chairs on the bare floor.At one table they were throwing poker dice, but the rest were drinkingbeer and talking in a desultory way. At the piano a man with a redmustache was mimicking the sextette fromLucia and a roar of applausemet us as we entered the room. Hunter led the way to a corner and putdown his bottles.

"What time do they close up?" I asked. In answer Hunter pointed to asign over the door. It was a card, neatly printed, and it said, "TheWhite Cat never sleeps."

"There are only two rules here," he explained. "That is one, and theother is, 'If you get too noisy, and the patrol wagon comes, make thedriver take you home.'"

The crowd was good-humored; it paid little or no attention to us, andwhen some one at the piano began to thump a waltz, Hunter, under coverof the noise, leaned over to me.

"We traced Fleming here, through your corner-man and the cabby," he saidcarefully. "I haven't seen him, but it is a moral certainty he isskulking in one of the up-stairs rooms. His precious private secretaryis here, too."

"I don't know Fleming by sight," the detective went on, "and thepictures we have of him were taken a good while ago, when he wore amustache. When he was in local politics, before he went to thelegislature, he practically owned this place, paying for favors withmembership tickets. A man could hide here for a year safely. The policenever come here, and a man's business is his own."

"Yes. There are four rooms up there for cards, and a bath-room. It's anold dwelling house. Would Fleming know you?"

As if in answer to my objection, Wardrop appeared at that moment. He randown the painted wooden stairs and hurried through the room withoutlooking to right or left. The piano kept on, and the men at the tableswere still engrossed with their glasses and one another. Wardrop wasvery pale; he bolted into a man at the door, and pushed him asidewithout ceremony.

"You might go up now," Hunter said, rising. "I will see where the younggentleman is making for. Just open the door of the different roomsup-stairs, look around for Fleming, and if any one notices you, ask ifAl Hunter is there. That will let you out."

He left me then, and after waiting perhaps a minute, I went up-stairsalone. The second floor was the ordinary upper story of a small dwellinghouse. The doors were closed, but loud talking, smoke, and the rattle ofchips floated out through open transoms. From below the noise of thepiano came up the staircase, unmelodious but rhythmical, and from thestreet on which the house faced an automobile was starting its engine,with a series of shot-like explosions.

The noise was confusing, disconcerting. I opened two doors, to find onlythe usual poker table, with the winners sitting quietly, their cardsbunched in the palms of their hands, and the losers, growing morevoluble as the night went on, buying chips recklessly, drinking morethan they should. The atmosphere was reeking with smoke.

The third door I opened was that of a dingy bath-room, with a zinc tuband a slovenly wash-stand. The next, however, was different. The lightstreamed out through the transom as in the other rooms, but there was nonoise from within. With my hand on the door, I hesitated—then, withHunter's injunction ringing in my ears, I opened it and looked in.

A breath of cool night air from an open window met me. There was nonoise, no smoke, no sour odor of stale beer. A table had been drawn tothe center of the small room, and was littered with papers, pen and ink.At one corner was a tray, containing the remnants of a meal; a pillowand a pair of blankets on a couch at one side showed the room had beenserving as a bedchamber.

But none of these things caught my eye at first. At the table, leaningforward, his head on his arms, was a man. I coughed, and receiving noanswer, stepped into the room.

Then the truth burst on me, overwhelmed me. A thin stream was spreadingover the papers on the table, moving slowly, sluggishly, as is the waywith blood when the heart pump is stopped. I hurried over and raised theheavy, wobbling, gray head. It was Allan Fleming and he had been shotthrough the forehead.

CHAPTER IX

ONLY ONE EYE CLOSED

My first impulse was to rouse the house; my second, to wait for Hunter.To turn loose that mob of half-drunken men in such a place seemedprofanation. There was nothing of the majesty or panoply of death here,but the very sordidness of the surroundings made me resolve to guard thenew dignity of that figure. I was shocked, of course; it would be absurdto say that I was emotionally unstrung. On the contrary, I was consciousof a distinct feeling of disappointment. Fleming had been our key to theBellwood affair, and he had put himself beyond helping to solve anymystery. I locked the door and stood wondering what to do next. I shouldhave called a doctor, no doubt, but I had seen enough of death to knowthat the man was beyond aid of any kind.

It was not until I had bolted the door that I discovered the absence ofany weapon. Everything that had gone before had pointed to a positionso untenable that suicide seemed its natural and inevitable result. Withthe discovery that there was no revolver on the table or floor, thething was more ominous. I decided at once to call the young cityphysician in the room across the hall, and with something approximatingpanic, I threw open the door—to face Harry Wardrop, and behind him,Hunter.

I do not remember that any one spoke. Hunter jumped past me into theroom and took in in a single glance what I had labored to acquire inthree minutes. As Wardrop came in, Hunter locked the door behind him,and we three stood staring at the prostrate figure over the table.

I watched Wardrop: I have never seen so suddenly abject a picture. Hedropped into a chair, and feeling for his handkerchief, wiped hisshaking lips; every particle of color left his face, and he was limp,unnerved.

"Did you hear the shot?" Hunter asked me. "It has been a matter ofminutes since it happened."

"I don't know," I said, bewildered. "I heard a lot of explosions, but Ithought it was an automobile, out in the street."

Hunter was listening while he examined the room, peering under thetable, lifting the blankets that had trailed off the couch on to thefloor. Some one outside tried the door-knob, and finding the doorlocked, shook it slightly.

We were silent, in response to a signal from Hunter, and the stepsretreated heavily down the hall. The detective spread the blanketsdecently over the couch, and the three of us moved the body there.Wardrop was almost collapsing.

"Now," Hunter said quietly, "before I call in Doctor Gray from the roomacross, what do you know about this thing, Mr. Wardrop?"

"He was in a bad way when I left this morning," he said huskily. "Thereisn't much use now trying to hide anything; God knows I've done all Icould. But he has been using cocaine for years, and to-day he ran out ofthe stuff. When I got here, about half an hour ago, he was on the vergeof killing himself. I got the revolver from him—he was like a crazyman, and as soon as I dared to leave him, I went out to try and find adoctor—"

Wardrop shuddered; then he pulled himself together, and his tone wasmore natural.

"What's the use of lying about it?" he said wearily. "You won't believeme if I tell the truth, either, but—he was dead when I got here. Iheard something like the bang of a door as I went up-stairs, but thenoise was terrific down below, and I couldn't tell. When I went in, hewas just dropping forward, and—" he hesitated.

"You will give it to me," Hunter replied sharply. And after a littlefumbling, Wardrop produced it from his hip pocket. It was an ordinarythirty-eight. The detective opened it and glanced at it. Two chamberswere empty.

"And you waited—say ten minutes, before you called for help, and eventhen you went outside hunting a doctor! What were you doing in those tenminutes?"

"If Mr. Fleming shot himself," the detective pursued relentlessly,"there would be powder marks around the wound. Then, too, he was in theact of writing a letter. It was a strange impulse, this—you see, he hadonly written a dozen words."

I glanced at the paper on the table. The letter had no superscription;it began abruptly:

"This is not suicide," Hunter said gravely. "It is murder, and I warnyou, Mr. Wardrop, to be careful what you say. Will you ask Doctor Grayto come in, Mr. Knox?"

I went across the hall to the room where the noise was loudest.Fortunately, Doctor Gray was out of the game. He was opening a can ofcaviar at a table in the corner and came out in response to a gesture.He did not ask any questions, and I let him go into the death chamberunprepared. The presence of death apparently had no effect on him, butthe identity of the dead man almost stupefied him.

"Fleming!" he said, awed, as he looked down at the body. "Fleming, byall that's sacred! And a suicide!"

The doctor glanced at the bullet wound in the forehead, and from theresignificantly to the group around the couch.

"Not an hour—probably less than half," he said. "It's strange we heardnothing, across the hall there."

Hunter took a clean folded handkerchief from his pocket and opening itlaid it gently over the dead face. I think it was a relief to all of us.The doctor got up from his kneeling posture beside the couch, andlooked at Hunter inquiringly.

"What about getting him away from here?" he said. "There is sure to be alot of noise about it, and—you remember what happened when Butlerkilled himself here."

"He was reported as being found dead in the lumber yard," Hunter saiddryly. "Well, Doctor, this body stays where it is, and I don't give awhoop if the whole city government wants it moved. It won't be. This ismurder, not suicide."

But Hunter had many things to attend to; he broke in ruthlessly on thedoctor's amazement.

"See if you can get the house empty, Doctor; just tell them he isdead—the story will get out soon enough."

As the doctor left the room Hunter went to the open window, throughwhich a fresh burst of rain was coming, and closed it. The window gaveme an idea, and I went over and tried to see through the streaming pane.There was no shed or low building outside, but not five yards away thewarehouse showed its ugly walls and broken windows.

"Look here, Hunter," I said, "why could he not have been shot from thewarehouse?"

"He could have been—but he wasn't," Hunter affirmed, glancing atWardrop's drooping figure. "Mr. Wardrop, I am going to send for thecoroner, and then I shall ask you to go with me to the office and tellthe chief what you know about this. Knox, will you telephone to thecoroner?"

In an incredibly short time the club-house was emptied, and beforemidnight the coroner himself arrived and went up to the room. As for me,I had breakfasted, lunched and dined on horrors, and I sat in thedeserted room down-stairs and tried to think how I was to take the newsto Margery.

At twelve-thirty Wardrop, Hunter and the coroner came down-stairs,leaving a detective in charge of the body until morning, when it couldbe taken home. The coroner had a cab waiting, and he took us at once toHunter's chief. He had not gone to bed, and we filed into his librarysepulchrally.

Wardrop told his story, but it was hardly convincing. The chief, a largeman who said very little, and leaned back with his eyes partly shut,listened in silence, only occasionally asking a question. The coroner,who was yawning steadily, left in the middle of Wardrop's story, as ifin his mind, at least, the guilty man was as good as hanged.

"I am—I was—Mr. Allan Fleming's private secretary," Wardrop began. "Isecured the position through a relationship on his wife's side. I haveheld the position for three years. Before that I read law. For some timeI have known that Mr. Fleming used a drug of some kind. Until a week agoI did not know what it was. On the ninth of May, Mr. Fleming sent forme. I was in Plattsburg at the time, and he was at home. He was in aterrible condition—not sleeping at all, and he said he was beingfollowed by some person who meant to kill him. Finally he asked me toget him some cocaine, and when he had taken it he was more like himself.I thought the pursuit was only in his own head. He had a man namedCarter on guard in his house, and acting as butler.

"There was trouble of some sort in the organization; I do not know justwhat. Mr. Schwartz came here to meet Mr. Fleming, and it seemed therewas money needed. Mr. Fleming had to have it at once. He gave me somesecurities to take to Plattsburg and turn into money. I went on thetenth—"

"Yes. He went to the White Cat, and stayed there. No one but thecaretaker and one other man knew he was there. On the night of thetwenty-first, I came back, having turned my securities into money. Icarried it in a package in a small Russia leather bag that never left myhand for a moment. Mr. Knox here suggested that I had put it down, andit had been exchanged for one just like it, but I did not let it out ofmy hand on that journey until I put it down on the porch at the Bellwoodhouse, while I tried to get in. I live at Bellwood, with the MissesMaitland, sisters of Mr. Fleming's deceased wife. I don't pretend toknow how it happened, but while I was trying to get into the house itwas rifled. Mr. Knox will bear me out in that. I found my grip empty."

"A pair of pajamas," he said, "two military brushes and a clothes-brush,two or three soft-bosomed shirts, perhaps a half-dozen collars, and asuit of underwear."

I think Wardrop realized the absurdity of trying to make any one believethat part of the story. He shut his lips and threw up his head as if heintended to say nothing further.

"Go on," I urged. If he could clear himself he must. I could not go backto Margery Fleming and tell her that her father had been murdered andher lover was accused of the crime.

"The bag was empty," he repeated. "I had not been five minutes trying toopen the shutters, and yet the bag had been rifled. Mr. Knox here foundit among the flowers below the veranda, empty."

"No, I am attorney to Miss Letitia Maitland, and was there one night asher guest. I found the bag as Mr. Wardrop described, empty."

"A hundred thousand dollars. I was afraid to tell Mr. Fleming, but I hadto do it. We had a stormy scene, this morning. I think he thought thenatural thing—that I had taken it."

"He was not himself; and, well, it meant a great deal to him. And he wasout of cocaine; I left him raging, and when I went home I learned thatMiss Jane Maitland had disappeared, been abducted, at the time mysatchel had been emptied! It's no wonder I question my sanity."

"To-night, I felt that some one would have to look after Mr. Fleming; Iwas afraid he would kill himself. It was a bad time to leave while MissJane was missing. But—when I got to the White Cat I found him dead. Hewas sitting with his back to the door, and his head on the table."

"You are sure?" from Hunter. "Isn't it a fact, Mr. Wardrop, that youtook Mr. Fleming's revolver from him this morning when he threatened youwith it?"

"You have been misinformed," he replied, but no one was impressed by histone. It was wavering, uncertain. From Hunter's face I judged it hadbeen a random shot, and had landed unexpectedly well.

"How many people knew that Mr. Fleming had been hiding at the WhiteCat?" from the chief.

"Very few—besides myself, only a man who looks after the club-house inthe mornings, and Clarkson, the cashier of the Borough Bank, who met himthere once by appointment."

"I opened the door into Mr. Fleming's room, perhaps a couple of minutesafter Mr. Wardrop went out," I said. "He was dead then, leaning on hisoutspread arms over the table; he had been shot in the forehead."

"There was considerable noise; I heard two or three sharp reports likethe explosions of an automobile engine."

"Not particularly; I thought, if I thought at all, that they were on thestreet."

"You are right about the automobile," Hunter said dryly. "The mayor senthis car away as I left to follow Mr. Wardrop. The sounds you heard werenot shots."

"It is a strange thing," the chief reflected, "that a revolver could befired in the upper room of an ordinary dwelling house, while that housewas filled with people—and nobody hear it. Were there any powder markson the body?"

"Thank you very much, gentlemen," he spoke quietly. "I think that isall. Hunter, I would like to see you for a few minutes."

I think Wardrop was dazed at finding himself free; he had expectednothing less than an immediate charge of murder. As we walked to thecorner for a car or cab, whichever materialized first, he looked back.

"I thought so," he said bitterly. A man was loitering after us along thestreet. The police were not asleep, they had only closed one eye.

The last train had gone. We took a night electric car to Wynton, andwalked the three miles to Bellwood. Neither of us was talkative, and Iimagine we were both thinking of Margery, and the news she would have tohear.

It had been raining, and the roads were vile. Once Wardrop turnedaround to where we could hear the detective splashing along, wellbehind.

"I hope he's enjoying it," he said. "I brought you by this road, so he'dhave to wade in mud up to his neck."

"The devil you did!" I exclaimed. "I'll have to be scraped with a knifebefore I can get my clothes off."

We both felt better for the laugh; it was a sort of nervous reaction.The detective was well behind, but after a while Wardrop stood still,while I plowed along. They came up together presently, and the three ofus trudged on, talking of immaterial things.

At the door Wardrop turned to the detective with a faint smile. "It'sraining again," he said, "you'd better come in. You needn't worry aboutme; I'm not going to run away, and there's a couch in the library."

The detective grinned, and in the light from the hall I recognized theman I had followed to the police station two nights before.

"I guess I will," he said, looking apologetically at his muddy clothes."This thing is only a matter of form, anyhow."

But he didn't lie down on the couch. He took a chair in the hall nearthe foot of the stairs, and we left him there, with the evening paperand a lamp. It was a queer situation, to say the least.

CHAPTER X

BREAKING THE NEWS

Wardrop looked so wretched that I asked him into my room, and mixed himsome whisky and water. When I had given him a cigar he began to look alittle less hopeless.

"You've been a darned sight better to me than I would have been to you,under the circumstances," he said gratefully.

"I thought we would better arrange about Miss Margery before we try tosettle down," I replied. "What she has gone through in the lasttwenty-four hours is nothing to what is coming to-morrow. Will you tellher about her father?"

"I believe it would come better from you," he said finally. "I am in thepeculiar position of having been suspected by her father of robbing him,by you of carrying away her aunt, and now by the police and everybodyelse of murdering her father."

"I do not suspect you of anything," I justified myself. "I don't thinkyou are entirely open, that is all, Wardrop. I think you are damagingyourself to shield some one else."

His expressive face was on its guard in a moment. He ceased his restlesspacing, pausing impressively before me.

"I give you my word as a gentleman—I do not know who killed Mr.Fleming, and that when I first saw him dead, my only thought was that hehad killed himself. He had threatened to, that day. Why, if you think Ikilled him, you would have to think I robbed him, too, in order to finda motive."

I did not tell him that that was precisely what Hunterdid think. Ievaded the issue.

"Probably," he said. "In the very nature of Mr. Fleming's position, weused figures all the time. Eleven twenty-two. That's the time thetheater train leaves the city for Bellwood. Not what you want, eh?"

"Not quite," I answered non-committally and began to wind my watch. Hetook the hint and prepared to leave.

"I'll not keep you up any longer," he said, picking up his raincoat. Heopened the door and stared ruefully down at the detective in the hallbelow. "The old place is queer without Miss Jane," he said irrelevantly."Well, good night, and thanks."

He went heavily along the hall and I closed my door, I heard him passMargery's room and then go back and rap lightly. She was evidentlyawake.

"It's Harry," he called. "I thought you wouldn't worry if you knew I wasin the house to-night."

"Yes, he is here," he said. He stood there for a moment, hesitating oversomething, but whatever it was, he decided against it.

The little familiarity made me wince. Every unattached man has the samepang now and then. I have it sometimes when Edith sits on the arm ofFred's chair, or one of the youngsters leaves me to run to "daddy." Andone of the sanest men I ever met went to his office and proposed to hisstenographer in sheer craving for domesticity, after watching the wifeof one of his friends run her hand over her husband's chin and give hima reproving slap for not having shaved!

I pulled myself up sharply and after taking off my dripping coat, I wentto the window and looked out into the May night. It seemed incrediblethat almost the same hour the previous night little Miss Jane haddisappeared, had been taken bodily away through the peace of the warmspring darkness, and that I, as wide-awake as I was at that moment,acute enough of hearing to detect Wardrop's careful steps on the gravelwalk below, had heard no struggle, had permitted this thing to happenwithout raising a finger in the old lady's defense. And she was gone ascompletely as if she had stepped over some psychic barrier into thefourth dimension!

I found myself avoiding the more recent occurrence at the White Cat. Iwas still too close to it to have gained any perspective. On thatsubject I was able to think clearly of only one thing: that I would haveto tell Margery in the morning, and that I would have given anything Ipossessed for a little of Edith's diplomacy with which to break the badnews. It was Edith who broke the news to me that the moths had got intomy evening clothes while I was hunting in the Rockies, by telling methat my dress-coat made me look narrow across the shoulders andpersuading me to buy a new one and give the old one to Fred. Then shebroke the news of the moths to Fred!

I was ready for bed when Wardrop came back and rapped at my door. He wasstill dressed, and he had the leather bag in his hand.

"Look here," he said excitedly, when I had closed the door, "this is notmy bag at all. Fool that I was. I never examined it carefully."

He held it out to me, and I carried it to the light. It was an ordinaryeighteen-inch Russia leather traveling-bag, tan in color, and withgold-plated mountings. It was empty, save for the railroad schedulethat still rested in one side pocket. Wardrop pointed to the emptypocket on the other side.

"In my bag," he explained rapidly, "my name was written inside thatpocket, in ink. I did it myself—my name and address."

"Don't you see?" he asked excitedly. "Whoever stole my bag had this oneto substitute for it. If we can succeed in tracing the bag here to theshop it came from, and from there to the purchaser, we have the thief."

"There's no maker's name in it," I said, after a casual examination.Wardrop's face fell, and he took the bag from me despondently.

"No matter which way I turn," he said, "I run into a blind alley. If Iwere worth a damn, I suppose I could find a way out. But I'm not. Well,I'll let you sleep this time."

At the door, however, he turned around and put the bag on the floor,just inside.

"If you don't mind, I'll leave it here," he said. "They'll be searchingmy room, I suppose, and I'd like to have the bag for future reference."

He went for good that time, and I put out the light. As an afterthoughtI opened my door perhaps six inches, and secured it with one of the pinkconch-shells which flanked either end of the stone hearth. I had failedthe night before: I meant to be on hand that night.

I went to sleep immediately, I believe. I have no idea how much later itwas that I roused. I wakened suddenly and sat up in bed. There had beena crash of some kind, for the shock was still vibrating along my nerves.Dawn was close; the window showed gray against the darkness inside, andI could make out dimly the larger objects in the room. I listenedintently, but the house seemed quiet. Still I was not satisfied. I gotup and, lighting the candle, got into my raincoat in lieu of adressing-gown, and prepared to investigate.

With the fatality that seemed to pursue my feet in that house, with myfirst step I trod squarely on top of the conch-shell, and I fell back onto the edge of the bed swearing softly and holding the injured member.Only when the pain began to subside did I realize that I had left theshell on the door-sill, and that it had moved at least eight feet whileI slept!

When I could walk I put it on the mantel, its mate from the other end ofthe hearth beside it. Then I took my candle and went out into the hall.My door, which I had left open, I found closed; nothing else wasdisturbed. The leather bag sat just inside, as Wardrop had left it.Through Miss Maitland's transom were coming certain strangled andirregular sounds, now falsetto, now deep bass, that showed that worthylady to be asleep. A glance down the staircase revealed Davidson,stretching in his chair and looking up at me.

"I'm frozen," he called up cautiously. "Throw me down a blanket or two,will you?"

I got a couple of blankets from my bed and took them down. He wasexamining his chair ruefully.

"There isn't any grip to this horsehair stuff," he complained. "Everytime I doze off I dream I'm coasting down the old hill back on the farm,and when I wake up I'm sitting on the floor, with the end of my backbone bent like a hook."

He wrapped himself in the blankets and sat down again, taking theprecaution this time to put his legs on another chair and thus anchorhimself. Then he produced a couple of apples and a penknife andproceeded to pare and offer me one.

"Found 'em in the pantry," he said, biting into one. "I belong to theapple society. Eat one apple every day and keep healthy!" He stopped andstared intently at the apple. "I reckon I got a worm that time," hesaid, with less ardor.

"I'll get something to wash him down," I offered, rising, but he wavedme back to my stair.

"Not on your life," he said with dignity. "Let him walk. How are thingsgoing up-stairs?"

"You didn't happen to be up there a little while ago, did you?" Iquestioned in turn.

"Some one came into my room and wakened me," I explained. "I heard aracket and when I got up I found a shell that I had put on the door-sillto keep the door open, in the middle of the room. I stepped on it."

He examined a piece of apple before putting it in his mouth. Then heturned a pair of shrewd eyes on me.

"No. I guess you won't step on it up there. Like the old woman: shesays, 'Motorman, if I put my foot on the rail will I be electrocuted?'And he says, 'No, madam, not unless you put your other foot on thetrolley wire.'"

"Some one had been in the room," I reiterated. "The door was closed,although I had left it open."

He finished his apple and proceeded with great gravity to drop theparings down the immaculate register in the floor beside his chair.Then—

"I've only got one business here, Mr. Knox," he said in an undertone,"and you know what that is. But if it will relieve your mind of thethought that there was anything supernatural about your visitor, I'lltell you that it was Mr. Wardrop, and that to the best of my belief hewas in your room, not once, but twice, in the last hour and a half. Asfar as that shell goes, it was I that kicked it, having gone up withoutmy shoes."

"What could he have wanted?" I exclaimed. But with his revelation,Davidson's interest ceased; he drew the blanket up around his shouldersand shivered.

I went back to bed, but not to sleep. I deliberately left the door wideopen, but no intrusion occurred. Once I got up and glanced down thestairs. For all his apparent drowsiness, Davidson heard my cautiousmovements, and saluted me in a husky whisper.

But I had none. I gave him a box of cigarettes, and after partiallydressing, I threw myself across the bed to wait for daylight. I wasroused by the sun beating on my face, to hear Miss Letitia's tones fromher room across.

"Nonsense," she was saying querulously. "Don't you suppose I can smell?Do you think because I'm a little hard of hearing that I've lost myother senses? Somebody's been smoking."

"You?" Miss Letitia snarled. "What are you smoking for? That ain't myshirt; it's my—"

"I ain't smokin'," yelled Heppie. "You won't let me tell you. I spilledvinegar on the stove; that's what you smell."

"Vinegar," she said with scorn. "Next thing you'll be telling me it'svinegar that Harry and Mr. Knox carry around in little boxes in theirpockets. You've pinned my cap to my scalp."

I hurried down-stairs to find Davidson gone. My blanket lay neatlyfolded, on the lower step, and the horsehair chairs were ranged alongthe wall as before. I looked around anxiously for telltale ashes, butthere was none, save, at the edge of the spotless register, a trace.Evidently they had followed the apple parings. It grew cold a day or solater, and Miss Letitia had the furnace fired, and although it does notbelong to my story, she and Heppie searched the house over to accountfor the odor of baking apples—a mystery that was never explained.

Wardrop did not appear at breakfast. Margery came down-stairs as Bellawas bringing me my coffee, and dropped languidly into her chair. Shelooked tired and white.

"Another day!" she said wearily. "Did you ever live through such aneternity as the last thirty-six hours?"

I responded absently; the duty I had assumed hung heavy over me. I had afrantic impulse to shirk the whole thing: to go to Wardrop and tell himit was his responsibility, not mine, to make this sad-eyed girl sadderstill. That as I had not his privilege of comforting her, neither shouldI shoulder his responsibility of telling her. But the issue was forcedon me sooner than I had expected, for at that moment I saw the glaringhead-lines of the morning paper, laid open at Wardrop's plate.

She must have followed my eyes, for we reached for it simultaneously.She was nearer than I, and her quick eye caught the name. Then I put myhand over the heading and she flushed with indignation.

"You are not to read it now," I said, meeting her astonished gaze asbest I could. "Please let me have it. I promise you I will give it toyou—almost immediately."

"You are very rude," she said without relinquishing the paper. "I saw apart of that; it is about my father!"

"Drink your coffee, please," I pleaded. "I will let you read it then. Onmy honor."

"How can you be so childish!" she exclaimed. "If there is anything inthat paper that it—will hurt me to learn, is a cup of coffee going tomake it any easier?"

I gave up then. I had always thought that people heard bad news betterwhen they had been fortified with something to eat, and I had a verydistinct recollection that Fred had made Edith drink something—teaprobably—before he told her that Billy had fallen off the back fenceand would have to have a stitch taken in his lip. Perhaps I should haveoffered Margery tea instead of coffee. But as it was, she sat, stonilyerect, staring at the paper, and feeling that evasion would be useless,I told her what had happened, breaking the news as gently as I could.

I stood by her helplessly through the tearless agony that followed, andcursed myself for a blundering ass. I had said that he had beenaccidentally shot, and I said it with the paper behind me, but she putthe evasion aside bitterly.

"Accidentally!" she repeated. The first storm of grief over, she liftedher head from where it had rested on her arms and looked at me, scorningmy subterfuge. "He was murdered. That's the word I didn't have time toread! Murdered! And you sat back and let it happen. I went to you intime and you didn't do anything. No one did anything!"

I did not try to defend myself. How could I? And afterward when she satup and pushed back the damp strands of hair from her eyes, she was morereasonable.

"I did not mean what I said about your not having done anything," shesaid, almost childishly. "No one could have done more. It was to happen,that's all."

But even then I knew she had trouble in store that she did not suspect.What would she do when she heard that Wardrop was under grave suspicion?Between her dead father and her lover, what? It was to be days before Iknew and in all that time, I, who would have died, not cheerfully but atleast stoically, for her, had to stand back and watch the struggle, notdaring to hold out my hand to help, lest by the very gesture she divinemy wild longing to hold her for myself.

She recovered bravely that morning from the shock, and refusing to go toher room and lie down—a suggestion, like the coffee, culled from myvicarious domestic life—she went out to the veranda and sat there inthe morning sun, gazing across the lawn. I left her there finally, andbroke the news of her brother-in-law's death to Miss Letitia. After thefirst surprise, the old lady took the news with what was nearercomplacency than resignation.

"Shot!" she said, sitting up in bed, while Heppie shook her pillows."It's a queer death for Allan Fleming; I always said he would behanged."

After that, she apparently dismissed him from her mind, and we talked ofher sister. Her mood had changed and it was depressing to find that shespoke of Jane always in the past tense. She could speak of her quitecalmly—I suppose the sharpness of our emotions is in inverse ratio toour length of years, and she regretted that, under the circumstances,Jane would not rest in the family lot.

"We are all there," she said, "eleven of us, counting my sister Mary'shusband, although he don't properly belong, and I always said we wouldtake him out if we were crowded. It is the best lot in the HopedaleCemetery; you can see the shaft for two miles in any direction."

We held a family council that morning around Miss Letitia's bed:Wardrop, who took little part in the proceedings, and who stood at awindow looking out most of the time, Margery on the bed, her arm aroundMiss Letitia's shriveled neck, and Heppie, who acted as interpreter andshouted into the old lady's ear such parts of the conversation as sheconsidered essential.

"I have talked with Miss Fleming," I said, as clearly as I could, "andshe seems to shrink from seeing people. The only friends she cares aboutare in Europe, and she tells me there are no other relatives."

Heppie condensed this into a vocal capsule, and thrust it into MissLetitia's ear. The old lady nodded.

"And yet," I went on, "there are things to look after, certain necessaryduties that no one else can attend to. I don't want to insist, but sheought, if she is able, to go to the city house, for a few hours, atleast."

"It ought to be cleaned," Miss Letitia acquiesced, "and fresh curtainsput up. Jane would have been in her element; she was always handy at afuneral. And don't let them get one of those let-down-at-the-sidecoffins. They're leaky."

"I was going to suggest," I put in hurriedly, "that my brother's wifewould be only too glad to help, and if Miss Fleming will go into townwith me, I am sure Edith would know just what to do. She isn't curiousand she's very capable."

Margery threw me a grateful glance, grateful, I think, that I couldunderstand how, under the circumstances, a stranger was more acceptablethan curious friends could be.

"When you have to say the letter 's,' turn your head away," Miss Letitiarebuked her. "Well, I don't object, if Knox's sister-in-law don't." Shehad an uncanny way of expanding Heppie's tabloid speeches. "You can takemy white silk shawl to lay over the body, but be sure to bring it back.We may need it for Jane."

If the old lady's chin quivered a bit, while Margery threw her armsaround her, she was mightily ashamed of it. But Heppie was made ofweaker stuff. She broke into a sudden storm of sobs and left the room,to stick her head in the door a moment after.

Wardrop went with us to the station at noon, but he left us there, witha brief remark that he would be up that night. After I had put Margeryin a seat, I went back to have a word with him alone. He was standingbeside the train, trying to light a cigarette, but his hands shookalmost beyond control, and after the fourth match he gave it up. Myminute for speech was gone. As the train moved out I saw him walkingback along the platform, paying no attention to anything around him.Also, I had a fleeting glimpse of a man loafing on a baggage truck, hishat over his eyes. He was paring an apple with a penknife, and droppingthe peelings with careful accuracy through a crack in the floor of theplatform.

I had arranged over the telephone that Edith should meet the train, andit was a relief to see that she and Margery took to each other at once.We drove to the house immediately, and after a few tears when she sawthe familiar things around her, Margery rose to the situation bravely.Miss Letitia had sent Bella to put the house in order, and it wasevident that the idea of clean curtains for the funeral had been drilledinto her until it had become an obsession. Not until Edith had concealedthe step-ladder were the hangings safe, and late in the afternoon weheard a crash from the library, and found Bella twisted on the floor,the result of putting a teakwood tabouret on a table and from thenceattacking the lace curtains of the library windows.

Edith gave her a good scolding and sent her off to soak her sprainedankle. Then she righted the tabouret, sat down on it and began on me.

"Do you know that you have not been to the office for two days?" shesaid severely. "And do you know that Hawes had hysterics in our fronthall last night? You had a case in court yesterday, didn't you?"

"Nothing very much," I said, looking over her head. "Anyhow, I'm tired.I don't know when I'm going back. I need a vacation."

She reached behind her and pulling the cord, sent the window shade tothe top of the window. At the sight of my face thus revealed, she drew along sigh.

"The girl was in trouble—is in trouble, Edith," I burst out. "Any onewould have done the same thing. Even Fred would hardly have desertedthat household. It's stricken, positively stricken."

"Of course it's your own affair," she said, not looking at me, "andgoodness knows I'm disinterested about it, you ruin the boys, bothstomachs and dispositions, and I could use your roomsplendidly as asewing-room—"

She dabbed at her eyes furiously with her handkerchief, and walked withgreat dignity to the door. Then she came back and put her hand on myarm.

"Oh, Jack, if we could only have saved you this!" she said, and a minutelater, when I did not speak: "Who is the man, dear?"

"A distant relative, Harry Wardrop," I replied, with what I think wasvery nearly my natural tone. "Don't worry, Edith. It's all right. I'veknown it right along."

"Pooh!" Edith returned sagely. "So do I know I've got to die and beburied some day. Its being inevitable doesn't make it any morecheerful." She went out, but she came back in a moment and stuck herhead through the door.

"That's the only inevitable thing there is," she said, taking up theconversation—an old habit of hers—where she had left off.

"I don't know what you are talking about," I retorted, turning my backon her. "And anyhow, I regard your suggestion as immoral." But when Iturned again, she had gone.

That Saturday afternoon at four o'clock the body of Allan Fleming wasbrought home, and placed in state in the music-room of the house.

Miss Jane had been missing since Thursday night. I called Hunter bytelephone, and he had nothing to report.

CHAPTER XI

A NIGHT IN THE FLEMING HOME

I had a tearful message from Hawes late that afternoon, and a littleafter five I went to the office. I found him offering late editions ofthe evening paper to a couple of clients, who were edging toward thedoor. His expression when he saw me was pure relief, the clients',relief strongly mixed with irritation.

I put the best face on the matter that I could, saw my visitors, andleft alone, prepared to explain to Hawes what I could hardly explain tomyself.

"I've been unavoidably detained, Hawes," I said, "Miss Jane Maitland hasdisappeared from her home."

"So I understood you over the telephone." He had brought my mail andstood by impassive.

"There was no one to do anything, Hawes. I was obliged to stay," Iapologized. I was ostentatiously examining my letters and Hawes saidnothing. I looked up at him sideways, and he looked down at me. Not amuscle of his face quivered, save one eye, which has a peculiartwitching of the lid when he is excited. It gave him a sardonicappearance of winking. He winked at me then.

"Don't wait, Hawes," I said guiltily, and he took his hat and went out.Every line of his back was accusation. The sag of his shoulders told meI had let my biggest case go by default that day; the forward tilt ofhis head, that I was probably insane; the very grip with which he seizedthe door-knob, his "good night" from around the door, that he knew therewas a woman at the bottom of it all. As he closed the door behind him Iput down my letters and dropped my face in my hands. Hawes was right. Noamount of professional zeal could account for the interest I had taken.Partly through force of circumstances, partly of my own volition, I hadplaced myself in the position of first friend to a family with which Ihad had only professional relations; I had even enlisted Edith, when myacquaintance with Margery Fleming was only three days old! And at thethought of the girl, of Wardrop's inefficiency and my own hopelessness,I groaned aloud.

"I forgot to tell you that a gentleman was here half a dozen timesto-day to see you. He didn't give any name."

"I have a little sherry in my office, Mr. Knox—twenty-six years in thewood. If you—"

"For God's sake, Hawes, there's nothing the matter with me!" Iexclaimed, and he went. But I heard him stand a perceptible time outsidethe door before he tiptoed away.

Almost immediately after, some one entered the waiting-room, and thenext moment I was facing, in the doorway, a man I had never seen before.

He was a tall man, with thin, colorless beard trimmed to a Vandykepoint, and pale eyes blinking behind glasses. He had a soft hat crushedin his hand, and his whole manner was one of subdued excitement.

"I have been here six times since noon," he said, dropping rather thansitting in a chair. "My name is Lightfoot. I am—was—Mr. Fleming'scashier."

"I was terribly shocked at the news of his death," he stumbled on,getting no help from me. "I was in town and if I had known in time Icould have kept some of the details out of the papers. Poor Fleming—tothink he would end it that way."

"But he didn't," I protested. "It was not suicide, Mr. Lightfoot.According to the police, it was murder."

His cold eyes narrowed like a cat's. "Murder is an ugly word, Mr. Knox.Don't let us be sensational. Mr. Fleming had threatened to kill himselfmore than once; ask young Wardrop. He was sick and despondent; he lefthis home without a word, which points strongly to emotional insanity. Hecould have gone to any one of a half dozen large clubs here, or at thecapital. Instead, he goes to a little third-rate political club, where,presumably, he does his own cooking and hides in a dingy room. Is thatsane? Murder! It was suicide, and that puppy Wardrop knows it wellenough. I—I wish I had him by the throat!"

"I have seen the police," he went on. "They agree with me that it wassuicide, and the party newspapers will straighten it out to-morrow. Itis only unfortunate that the murder theory was given so much publicity.TheTimes-Post, which is Democratic, of course, I can not handle."

"Suicide!" I said finally. "With no weapon, no powder marks, and with ahalf-finished letter at his elbow."

"Mr. Fleming had been—careless," he said. "I can tell you inconfidence, that some of the state funds had been deposited in theBorough Bank of Manchester, and—the Borough Bank closed its doors atten o'clock to-day."

"I arrived here last night," he said, "and I searched the city for Mr.Fleming. This morning I heard the news. I have just come from the house:his daughter referred me to you. After all, what I want is a smallmatter. Some papers—state documents—are missing, and no doubt areamong Mr. Fleming's private effects. I would like to go through hispapers, and leave to-night for the capital."

"I have hardly the authority," I replied doubtfully. "Miss Fleming, Isuppose, would have no objection. His private secretary, Wardrop, wouldbe the one to superintend such a search."

"I will make an attempt," I said. "Let me have the name of your hotel,and I will telephone you if it can be arranged for to-night."

He had to be satisfied with that, but his eagerness seemed to me to bealmost desperation. Oddly enough, I could not locate Wardrop after all.I got the Maitland house by telephone, to learn that he had left thereabout three o'clock, and had not come back.

I went to the Fleming house for dinner. Edith was still there, and weboth tried to cheer Margery, a sad little figure in her black clothes.After the meal, I called Lightfoot at his hotel, and told him that Icould not find Wardrop; that there were no papers at the house, and thatthe office safe would have to wait until Wardrop was found to open it.He was disappointed and furious; like a good many men who are physicalcowards, he said a great deal over the telephone that he would not havedared to say to my face, and I cut him off by hanging up the receiver.From that minute, in the struggle that was coming, like Fred, I was"forninst" the government.

It was arranged that Edith should take Margery home with her for thenight. I thought it a good idea; the very sight of Edith tucking in herbabies and sitting down beside the library lamp to embroider me ascarfpin-holder for Christmas would bring Margery back to normal again.Except in the matter of Christmas gifts, Edith is the sanest woman Iknow; I recognized it at the dinner table, where she had the little girlacross from her planning her mourning hats before the dinner was halffinished.

When we rose at last, Margery looked toward the music-room, where thedead man lay in state. But Edith took her by the arm and pushed hertoward the stairs.

"Get your hat on right away, while Jack calls a cab," she directed. "Imust get home, or Fred will keep the boys up until nine o'clock. He isabsolutely without principle."

When Margery came down there was a little red spot burning in each palecheek, and she ran down the stairs like a scared child. At the bottomshe clutched the newel-post and looked behind fearfully.

"Some one has been up-stairs," Margery panted. "Somebody has beenstaying in the house while we were away."

"Nonsense," I said, seeing that her fright was infecting Edith. "Whatmakes you think that?"

"Come and look," she said, gaining courage, I suppose, from a masculinepresence. And so we went up the long stairs, the two girls clutchinghands, and I leading the way and inclined to scoff.

At the door of a small room next to what had been Allan Fleming'sbedroom, we paused and I turned on the light.

"Before we left," Margery said more quietly, "I closed this room myself.It had just been done over, and the pale blue soils so easily. I came inthe last thing, and saw covers put over everything. Now look at it!"

It was a sort of boudoir, filled with feminine knickknacks and mahoganylounging chairs. Wherever possible, a pale brocade had been used, on theempire couch, in panels in the wall, covering cushions on thewindow-seat. It was evidently Margery's private sitting-room.

The linen cover that had been thrown over the divan was folded back, anda pillow from the window-seat bore the imprint of a head. The table wasstill covered, knobby protuberances indicating the pictures and booksbeneath. On one corner of the table, where the cover had been pushedaside, was a cup, empty and clean-washed, and as if to prove hercontention, Margery picked up from the floor a newspaper, dated Fridaymorning, the twenty-second.

A used towel in the bath-room near-by completed the inventory; Margeryhad been right; some one had used the room while the house was closed.

"Might it not have been your—father?" Edith asked, when we stood againat the foot of the stairs. "He could have come here to look forsomething, and lain down to rest."

"I don't think so," Margery said wanly. "I left the door so he could getin with his key, but—he always used his study couch. I don't think heever spent five minutes in my sitting-room in his life."

We had to let it go at that finally. I put them in a cab, and saw themstart away: then I went back into the house. I had arranged to sleepthere and generally to look after things—as I said before. Whateverscruples I had had about taking charge of Margery Fleming and heraffairs, had faded with Wardrop's defection and the new mystery of theblue boudoir.

The lower floor of the house was full of people that night, local andstate politicians, newspaper men and the usual crowd of the morbidlycurious. The undertaker took everything in hand, and late that evening Icould hear them carrying in tropical plants and stands for the flowersthat were already arriving. Whatever panoply the death scene had lacked,Allan Fleming was lying in state now.

At midnight things grew quiet. I sat in the library, reading, untilthen, when an undertaker's assistant in a pink shirt and polka-dotcravat came to tell me that everything was done.

"Is it customary for somebody to stay up, on occasions like this?" Iasked. "Isn't there an impression that wandering cats may get into theroom, or something of that sort?"

"I don't think it will be necessary, sir," he said, trying to conceal asmile. "It's all a matter of taste. Some people like to take theirtroubles hard. Since they don't put money on their eyes any more, nobodywants to rob the dead."

He left with that cheerful remark, and I closed and locked the houseafter him. I found Bella in the basement kitchen with all the lightsburning full, and I stood at the foot of the stairs while she scooted tobed like a scared rabbit. She was a strange creature, Bella—not sostupid as she looked, but sullen, morose—"smouldering" about expressesit.

I closed the doors into the dining-room and, leaving one light in thehall, went up to bed. A guest room in the third story had been assignedme, and I was tired enough to have slept on the floor. The telephonebell rang just after I got into bed, and grumbling at my luck, I wentdown to the lower floor.

"Mr. Knox, are you willing to put yourself on record that Mr. Flemingcommitted suicide?"

"To-night'sStar says you call it suicide, and that you found him withthe revolver in his hand."

I went back to bed, irritated that I had betrayed myself. Loss of sleepfor two nights, however, had told on me: in a short time I was soundasleep.

I wakened with difficulty. My head felt stupid and heavy, and I wasburning with thirst. I sat up and wondered vaguely if I were going to beill, and I remember that I felt too weary to get a drink. As I roused,however, I found that part of my discomfort came from bad ventilation,and I opened a window and looked out.

The window was a side one, opening on to a space perhaps eight feetwide, which separated it from its neighbor. Across from me was only ablank red wall, but the night air greeted me refreshingly. The wind wasblowing hard, and a shutter was banging somewhere below. I leaned outand looked down into the well-like space beneath me. It was one of thoseapparently chance movements that have vital consequences, and that havealways made me believe in the old Calvinistic creed of foreordination.

Below me, on the wall across, was a rectangle of yellow light, reflectedfrom the library window of the Fleming home. There was some one in thehouse.

As I still stared, the light was slowly blotted out—not as if the lighthad been switched off, but by a gradual decreasing in size of thelighted area. The library shade had been drawn.

My first thought was burglars; my second—Lightfoot. No matter who itwas, there was no one who had business there. Luckily, I had brought myrevolver with me from Fred's that day, and it was under my pillow; toget it, put out the light and open the door quietly, took only a minute.I was in pajamas, barefoot, as on another almost similar occasion, but Iwas better armed than before.

I got to the second floor without hearing or seeing anything suspicious,but from there I could see that the light in the hall had beenextinguished. The unfamiliarity of the house, the knowledge of thesilent figure in the drawing-room at the foot of the stairs, and ofwhatever might be waiting in the library beyond, made my positionuncomfortable, to say the least.

I don't believe in the man who is never afraid: he doesn't deserve thecredit he gets. It's the fellow who is scared to death, whose kneesknock together, and who totters rather than walks into danger, who isthe real hero. Not that I was as bad as that, but I would have liked toknow where the electric switch was, and to have seen the trap before Iput my head in.

The stairs were solidly built, and did not creak. I felt my way down bythe baluster, which required my right hand, and threw my revolver to myleft. I got safely to the bottom, and around the newel-post: there wasstill a light in the library, and the door was not entirely closed.Then, with my usual bad luck, I ran into a heap of folding chairs thathad been left by the undertaker, and if the crash paralyzed me, I don'tknow what it did to the intruder in the library.

The light was out in an instant, and with concealment at an end, I brokefor the door and threw it open, standing there with my revolver leveled.We—the man in the room, and I—were both in absolute darkness. He hadthe advantage of me. He knew my location, and I could not guess his.

"Speak up, or I'll shoot!" I said, not without an ugly feeling that hemight be—even probably was—taking careful aim by my voice. Thedarkness was intolerable: I reached cautiously to the left and found,just beyond the door frame, the electric switch. As I turned it thelight flashed up. The room was empty, but a portière in a doorway at myright was still shaking.

I leaped for the curtain and dragged it aside, to have a door just closein my face. When I had jerked it open, I found myself in a short hall,and there were footsteps to my left, I blundered along in thesemi-darkness, into a black void which must have been the dining-room,for my outstretched hand skirted the table. The footsteps seemed onlybeyond my reach, and at the other side of the room the swinging doorinto the pantry was still swaying when I caught it.

I made a misstep in the pantry, and brought up against a blank wall. Itseemed to me I heard the sound of feet running up steps, and when Ifound a door at last, I threw it open and dashed in.

The next moment the solid earth slipped from under my feet, I threw outmy hand, and it met a cold wall, smooth as glass. Then I fell—fell anincalculable distance, and the blackness of the night came over me andsmothered me.

CHAPTER XII

MY COMMISSION

When I came to, I was lying in darkness, and the stillness was absolute.When I tried to move, I found I was practically a prisoner: I had falleninto an air shaft, or something of the kind. I could not move my arms,where they were pinioned to my sides, and I was half-lying,half-crouching, in a semi-vertical position. I worked one arm loose andmanaged to make out that my prison was probably the dumb-waiter shaft tothe basement kitchen.

I had landed on top of the slide, and I seemed to be tied in a knot. Therevolver was under me, and if it had exploded during the fall it haddone no damage. I can hardly imagine a more unpleasant position. If theman I had been following had so chosen, he could have made away with mein any one of a dozen unpleasant ways—he could have filled me as fullof holes as a sieve, or scalded me, or done anything, pretty much, thathe chose. But nothing happened. The house was impressively quiet.

I had fallen feet first, evidently, and then crumpled up unconscious,for one of my ankles was throbbing. It was some time before I couldstand erect, and even by reaching, I could not touch the doorway aboveme. It must have taken five minutes for my confused senses to rememberthe wire cable, and to tug at it. I was a heavy load for the slide,accustomed to nothing weightier than political dinners, but with muchcreaking I got myself at last to the floor above, and stepped out, stillinto darkness, but free.

I still held the revolver, and I lighted the whole lower floor. But Ifound nothing in the dining-room or the pantry. Everything was lockedand in good order. A small alcove off the library came next; it wasundisturbed, but a tabouret lay on its side, and a half dozen books hadbeen taken from a low book-case, and lay heaped on a chair. In thelibrary, however, everything was confusion. Desk drawers stood open—oneof the linen shades had been pulled partly off its roller, a chair hadbeen drawn up to the long mahogany table in the center of the room, withthe electric dome overhead, and everywhere, on chairs, over the floor,heaped in stacks on the table, were papers.

After searching the lower floor, and finding everything securely locked,I went up-stairs, convinced the intruder was still in the house. I madea systematic search of every room, looking into closets and under beds.Several times I had an impression, as I turned a corner, that some onewas just ahead of me, but I was always disappointed. I gave up at last,and, going down to the library, made myself as comfortable as I could,and waited for morning.

I heard Bella coming down the stairs, after seven sometime; she cameslowly, with flagging footsteps, as if the slightest sound would sendher scurrying to the upper regions again. A little later I heard herrattling the range in the basement kitchen, and I went up-stairs anddressed.

I was too tired to have a theory about the night visitor; in fact, fromthat time on, I tried to have no theories of any kind. I was impressedwith only one thing—that the enemy or enemies of the late AllanFleming evidently carried their antagonism beyond the grave. As I put onmy collar I wondered how long I could stay in this game, as I now meantto, and avoid lying in state in Edith's little drawing-room, withflowers around and a gentleman in black gloves at the door.

I had my ankle strapped with adhesive that morning by my doctor and itgave me no more trouble. But I caught him looking curiously at the bluebruise on my forehead where Wardrop had struck me with the chair, and atmy nose, no longer swollen, but mustard-yellow at the bridge.

"How does the other fellow look?" he inquired, and to my haltinglyinvented explanation of my battered appearance, he returned the sameenigmatical smile.

That day was uneventful. Margery and Edith came to the house for aboutan hour and went back to Fred's again.

A cousin of the dead man, an elderly bachelor named Parker, appearedthat morning and signified his willingness to take charge of the houseduring that day. The very hush of his voice and his black tie promptedEdith to remove Margery from him as soon as she could, and as the girldreaded the curious eyes of the crowd that filled the house, she wasglad to go.

It was Sunday, and I went to the office only long enough to look over mymail. I dined in the middle of the day at Fred's, and felt heavy andstupid all afternoon as a result of thus reversing the habits of theweek. In the afternoon I had my first conversation with Fred and Edith,while Margery and the boys talked quietly in the nursery. They had takena great fancy to her, and she was almost cheerful when she was withthem.

Fred had the morning papers around him on the floor, and was in hisusual Sunday argumentative mood.

"Well," he said, when the nursery door up-stairs had closed, "what wasit, Jack? Suicide?"

"How can I tell?" irritably. "The police say it was suicide, and theyought to know."

"TheTimes-Post says it was murder, and that they will prove it. Andthey claim the police have been called off."

I said nothing of Mr. Lightfoot, and his visit to the office, but I madea mental note to see theTimes-Post people and learn, if I could, whatthey knew.

"I can not help thinking that he deserved very nearly what he got,"Edith broke in, looking much less vindictive than her words. "When onethinks of the ruin he brought to poor Henry Butler, and that Ellen hasbeen practically an invalid ever since, I can't be sorry for him."

"What was the Butler story?" I asked. But Fred did not know, and Edithwas as vague as women usually are in politics.

"Henry Butler was treasurer of the state, and Mr. Fleming was hiscashier. I don't know just what the trouble was. But you remember thatHenry Butler killed himself after he got out of the penitentiary, andEllen has been in one hospital after another. I would like to have hercome here for a few weeks, Fred," she said appealingly. "She is in somesanatorium or other now, and we might cheer her a little."

"Have her if you like, petty," he said resignedly, "but I refuse to becheerful unless I feel like it. What about this young Wardrop, Jack? Itlooks to me as if theTimes-Post reporter had a line on him."

"Look at her engagement ring," Edith threw back triumphantly. "And it'sa perfectly beautiful solitaire, too."

I caught Fred's eye on me, and the very speed with which he shifted hisgaze made me uncomfortable. I made my escape as soon as I could, on theplea of going out to Bellwood, and in the hall up-stairs I met Margery.

"I saw Bella to-day," she said. "Mr. Knox, will you tell me why youstayed up last night? What happened in the house?"

"I—thought I heard some one in the library," I stammered, "but I foundno one."

"Is that all the truth or only part of it?" she asked. "Why do menalways evade issues with a woman?" Luckily, woman-like, she did not waitfor a reply. She closed the nursery door and stood with her hand on theknob, looking down.

"I wonder what you believe about all this," she said. "Do you think myfather—killed himself? You were there; you know. If some one would onlytell me everything!"

It seemed to me it was her right to know. The boys were romping noisilyin the nursery. Down-stairs Fred and Edith were having their Sundayafternoon discussion of what in the world had become of the money fromFred's latest book. Margery and I sat down on the stairs, and, as wellas I could remember the details, I told her what had happened at theWhite Cat. She heard me through quietly.

"And so the police have given up the case!" she said despairingly. "Andif they had not, Harry would have been arrested. Is there nothing I cando? Do I have to sit back with my hands folded?"

"The police have not exactly given up the case," I told her, "but thereis such a thing, of course, as stirring up a lot of dust and thenrunning to cover like blazes before it settles. By the time the publichas wiped it out of its eyes and sneezed it out of its nose and coughedit out of its larynx, the dust has settled in a heavy layer, clues areobliterated, and the public lifts its skirts and chooses anotherdirection. The 'no thoroughfare' sign is up."

She sat there for fifteen minutes, interrupted by occasional noisyexcursions from the nursery, which resulted in her acquiring by degreesa lapful of broken wheels, three-legged horses and a live water beetlewhich the boys had found under the kitchen sink and imprisoned in aglass topped box, where, to its bewilderment, they were assiduouslyoffering it dead and mangled flies. But our last five minutes wereundisturbed, and the girl brought out with an effort the request she hadtried to make all day.

"Whoever killed my father—and it was murder, Mr. Knox—whoever did itis going free to save a scandal. All my—friends"—she smiledbitterly—"are afraid of the same thing. But I can not sit quiet andthink nothing can be done. Imust know, and you are the only one whoseems willing to try to find out."

So it was, that, when I left the house a half hour later, I wascommitted. I had been commissioned by the girl I loved—for it had cometo that—to clear her lover of her father's murder, and so give him backto her—not in so many words, but I was to follow up the crime, and therest followed. And I was morally certain of two things—first, that herlover was not worthy of her, and second, and more to the point, thatinnocent or guilty, he was indirectly implicated in the crime.

I had promised her also to see Miss Letitia that day if I could, and Iturned over the events of the preceding night as I walked toward thestation, but I made nothing of them. One thing occurred to me, however.Bella had told Margery that I had been up all night. Could Bella—? ButI dismissed the thought as absurd—Bella, who had scuttled to bed in apanic of fright, would never have dared the lower floor alone, andBella, given all the courage in the world, could never have moved withthe swiftness and light certainty of my midnight prowler. It had notbeen Bella.

But after all I did not go to Bellwood. I met Hunter on my way to thestation, and he turned around and walked with me.

"So you've lain down on the case!" I said, when we had gone a few stepswithout speaking.

"Of course," I persisted, "being a simple and uncomplicated case ofsuicide, there was nothing in it anyhow. If it had been a murder, underpeculiar circumstances—"

"For ten cents," he said gravely, "I would tell the chief and a fewothers what I think of them. And then I'd go out and get full."

"I'm going out of the business," he stormed. "I'm going to drive agarbage wagon: it's cleaner than this job. Suicide! I never saw acleaner case of—" He stopped suddenly. "Do you know Burton—of theTimes-Post?"

"Well, he's your man. They're dead against the ring, and Burton's beengiven the case. He's as sharp as a steel trap. You two get together."

He paused at a corner. "Good-by," he said dejectedly. "I'm off to huntsome boys that have been stealing milk bottles. That's about my size,these days." He turned around, however, before he had gone many stepsand came back.

"Wardrop has been missing since yesterday afternoon," he said. "That is,he thinks he's missing. We've got him all right."

I gave up my Bellwood visit for the time, and taking a car down-town, Iwent to theTimes-Post office. The Monday morning edition was alreadyunder way, as far as the staff was concerned, and from the waiting-roomI could see three or four men, with their hats on, most of themrattling typewriters. Burton came in in a moment, a red-haired youngfellow, with a short thick nose and a muggy skin. He was rather stockyin build, and the pugnacity of his features did not hide the shrewdnessof his eyes.

"Can't we talk in a more private place?" I asked, trying to raise myvoice above the confusion of the next room. In reply he took me into atiny office, containing a desk and two chairs, and separated by aneight-foot partition from the other room.

"This is the best we have," he explained cheerfully. "Newspapers areagents of publicity, not privacy—if you don't care what you say."

I liked Burton. There was something genuine about him; after Wardrop'skid-glove finish, he was a relief.

"Hunter, of the detective bureau, sent me here," I proceeded, "about theFleming case."

He took out his note-book. "You are the fourth to-day," he said. "Hunterhimself, Lightfoot from Plattsburg, and McFeely here in town. Well, Mr.Knox, are you willing now to put yourself on record that Flemingcommitted suicide?"

"And that the secretary fellow, what's his name?—Wardrop?—that hekilled him?"

In reply Burton fumbled in his pocket and brought up a pasteboard box,filled with jeweler's cotton. Underneath was a small object, which hepassed to me with care.

"I got it from the coroner's physician, who performed the autopsy," hesaid casually. "You will notice that it is a thirty-two, and that therevolver they took from Wardrop was a thirty-eight. Question, where'sthe other gun?"

"Little thing, isn't it?" he said. "We think we're lords of creation,until we see a quarter-inch bichloride tablet, or a bit of lead likethis. Look here." He dived into his pocket again and drew out a roll ofordinary brown paper. When he opened it a bit of white chalk fell on thedesk.

"Look at that," he said dramatically. "Kill an army with it, and they'dnever know what struck them. Cyanide of potassium—and the druggist thatsold it ought to be choked."

"It's a beautiful case, all around," he said, as he got his hat. "Ihaven't had any Sunday dinner yet, and it's five o'clock. Oh—thecyanide? Clarkson, the cashier of the bank Fleming ruined, took a biteoff that corner right there, this morning."

CHAPTER XIII

SIZZLING METAL

Burton listened while he ate, and his cheerful comments were welcomeenough after the depression of the last few days. I told him, after somehesitation, the whole thing, beginning with the Maitland pearls andending with my drop down the dumb-waiter. I knew I was absolutely safein doing so: there is no person to whom I would rather tell a secretthan a newspaper man. He will go out of his way to keep it: he will lockit in the depths of his bosom, and keep it until seventy times seven.Also, you may threaten the rack or offer a larger salary, the seal doesnot come off his lips until the word is given. If then he makes ascarehead of it, and gets in three columns of space and as manyphotographs, it is his just reward.

So—I told Burton everything, and he ate enough beefsteak for two men,and missed not a word I said.

"The money Wardrop had in the grip—that's easy enough explained," hesaid. "Fleming used the Borough Bank to deposit state funds in. He musthave known it was rotten: he and Clarkson were as thick as thieves.According to a time-honored custom in our land of the brave and home ofthe free, a state treasurer who is crooked can, in such a case, draw onsuch a bank without security, on his personal note, which is usuallyworth its value by the pound as old paper."

"He did. Then things got bad at the Borough Bank. Fleming had had todivide with Schwartz and the Lord only knows who all, but it was Flemingwho had to put in the money to avert a crash—the word crash beingsynonymous with scandal in this case. He scrapes together a paltryhundred thousand, which Wardrop gets at the capital, and brings on.Wardrop is robbed, or says he is: the bank collapses and Clarkson,driven to the wall, kills himself, just after Fleming is murdered. Whatdoes that sound like?"

"Like Clarkson!" I exclaimed. "And Clarkson knew Fleming was hiding atthe White Cat!"

"Now, then, take the other theory," he said, pushing aside his cup."Wardrop goes in to Fleming with a story that he has been robbed:Fleming gets crazy and attacks him. All that is in the morning—Friday.Now, then—Wardrop goes back there that night. Within twenty minutesafter he enters the club he rushes out, and when Hunter follows him, hesays he is looking for a doctor, to get cocaine for a gentlemanup-stairs. He is white and trembling. They go back together, and findyou there, and Fleming dead. Wardrop tells two stories: first he saysFleming committed suicide just before he left. Then he changes it andsays he was dead when he arrived there. He produces the weapon withwhich Fleming is supposed to have killed himself, and which, by the way,Miss Fleming identified yesterday as her father's. But there are twodiscrepancies. Wardrop practically admitted that he had taken thatrevolver from Fleming, not that night, but the morning before, duringthe quarrel."

"The bullet. Nobody ever fired a thirty-two bullet out of athirty-eight caliber revolver—unless he was trying to shoot adouble-compound curve. Now, then, who does it look like?"

"And he didn't do it himself for two good reasons: he had no revolverthat night, and there were no powder marks."

"I'll have to have another steak, if I'm to settle that," he said. "Ican only solve one murder on one steak. But disappearances are myspecialty; perhaps, if I have a piece of pie and some cheese—"

"I can't quite see the old lady in it," he confessed. "She hadn't anygrudge against Fleming, had she? Wouldn't be likely to forget herselftemporarily and kill him?"

"Good Lord!" I said. "Why, she's sixty-five, and as timid and gentle alittle old lady as ever lived."

"Wouldn't be likely to have eloped with the minister, or advertised fora husband, or anything like that?"

"You would have to know her to understand," I said resignedly. "But shedidn't do any of those things, and she didn't run off to join atheatrical troupe. Burton, who do you think was in the Fleming houselast night?"

"I believe I'll run over to the capital to-night," he said. "While I'mgone—I'll be back to-morrow night or the next morning—I wish you woulddo two things. Find Rosie O'Grady, or whatever her name is, and locateCarter. That's probably not his name, but it will answer for a while.Then get your friend Hunter to keep him in sight for a while, until Icome back anyhow. I'm beginning to enjoy this; it's more fun than apicture puzzle. We're going to make the police department look like akindergarten playing jackstraws."

"Go to Bellwood and find out a few things. It's all well enough to saythe old lady was a meek and timid person, but if you want to know herpeculiarities, go to her neighbors. When people leave the beaten path,the neighbors always know it before the families."

"I'll have to pack for my little jaunt," he said, and purchased atooth-brush, which proved to be the extent of his preparations. Weseparated at the station, Burton to take his red hair and histooth-brush to Plattsburg, I to take a taxicab, and armed with a pagetorn from the classified directory to inquire at as many of the twelveAnderson's drug-stores as might be necessary to locate Delia's gentlemanfriend, "the clerk," through him Delia, and through Delia, themysterious Carter, "who was not really a butler."

It occurred to me somewhat tardily, that I knew nothing of Delia but hergiven name. A telephone talk with Margery was of little assistance:Delia had been a new maid, and if she had heard her other name, she hadforgotten it.

I had checked off eight of the Andersons on my list, without result, andthe taximeter showed something over nineteen dollars, when the driverdrew up at the curb.

I opened the door and glanced behind. A duplicate of my cab stoodperhaps fifty feet behind, and from it a familiar figure was slowlyemerging, carrying on a high-pitched argument with the chauffeur. Thefigure stopped to read the taximeter, shook his fist at the chauffeur,and approached me, muttering audibly. It was Davidson.

"That liar and thief back there has got me rung up for nineteendollars," he said, ignoring my amazement. "Nineteen dollars and fortycents! He must have the thing counting the revolutions of all fourwheels!"

He walked around and surveyed my expense account, at the driver's elbow.Then he hit the meter a smart slap, but the figures did not change.

"Nineteen dollars!" he repeated dazed. "Nineteen dollars and—lookhere," he called to his driver, who had brought the cab close, "it'sonly thirty cents here. Your clock's ten cents fast."

"You back up to nineteen dollars and thirty cents," he persisted,ignoring me. "If you'll back up to twelve dollars, I'll pay it. That'sall I've got." Then he turned on me irritably. "Good heavens, man," heexclaimed, "do you mean to tell me you've been to eight drug-stores thisSunday evening and spent nineteen dollars and thirty cents, and haven'tgot a drink yet?"

"Do you think I'm after a drink?" I asked him. "Now look here, Davidson,I rather think you know what I am after. If you don't, it doesn'tmatter. But since you are coming along anyhow, pay your man off and comewith me. I don't like to be followed."

He agreed without hesitation, borrowed eight dollars from me to augmenthis twelve and crawled in with me.

"The next address on the list is the right one," he said, as the manwaited for directions. "I did the same round yesterday, but not being aplutocrat, I used the street-cars and my legs. And because you're adecent fellow and don't have to be chloroformed to have an ideainjected, I'm going to tell you something. There were eleven roundsmenas well as the sergeant who heard me read the note I found at theFleming house that night. You may have counted them through the window.A dozen plain-clothes men read it before morning. When the news of Mr.Fleming's mur—death came out, I thought this fellow Carter might knowsomething, and I trailed Delia through this Mamie Brennan. When I gotthere I found Tom Brannigan and four other detectives sitting in theparlor, and Miss Delia, in a blue silk waist, making eyes at everymother's son of them."

I laughed in spite of my disappointment. Davidson leaned forward andclosed the window at the driver's back. Then he squared around and facedme.

"Understand me, Mr. Knox," he said, "Mr. Fleming killed himself. You andI are agreed on that. Even if you aren't just convinced of it I'mtelling you, and—better let it drop, sir," Under his quiet manner Ifelt a threat: it served to rouse me.

"I'll let it drop when I'm through with it," I asserted, and got out mylist of addresses.

"You'll let it drop because it's too hot to hold," he retorted, with thesuspicion of a smile. "If you are determined to know about Carter, I cantell you everything that is necessary."

The chauffeur stopped his engine with an exasperated jerk and settleddown in his seat, every line of his back bristling with irritation.

"You'll have to travel some to do it, son," he said. "Carter left forparts unknown last night, taking with him enough money to keep him incomfort for some little time."

"The trip was for the benefit of his health. He has been suffering—andis still suffering, from a curious lapse of memory." Davidson smiled atme engagingly. "He has entirely forgotten everything that occurred fromthe time he entered Mr. Fleming's employment, until that gentleman lefthome. I doubt if he will ever recover."

With Carter gone, his retreat covered by the police, supplied with fundsfrom some problematical source, further search for him was worse thanuseless. In fact, Davidson strongly intimated that it might be dangerousand would be certainly unpleasant. I yielded ungraciously and orderedthe cab to take me home. But on the way I cursed my folly for not havingfollowed this obvious clue earlier, and I wondered what this thing couldbe that Carter knew, that was at least surmised by various headquartersmen, and yet was so carefully hidden from the world at large.

The party newspapers had come out that day with a signed statement fromMr. Fleming's physician in Plattsburg that he had been in ill health andinclined to melancholia for some time. The air was thick with rumors ofdifferences with his party: the dust cloud covered everything; prettysoon it would settle and hide the tracks of those who had hurried tocover under its protection.

Davidson left me at a corner down-town. He turned to give me a partingadmonition.

"There's an old axiom in the mills around here, 'never sit down on apiece of metal until you spit on it.' If it sizzles, don't sit." Hegrinned. "Your best position just now, young man, is standing, with yourhands over your head. Confidentially, there ain't anything withinexpectorating distance just now that ain't pretty well het up."

He left me with that, and I did not see him again until the night at theWhite Cat, when he helped put me through the transom. Recently, however,I have met him several times. He invariably mentions the eight dollarsand his intention of repaying it. Unfortunately, the desire and theability have not yet happened to coincide.

I took the evening train to Bellwood, and got there shortly after eight,in the midst of the Sunday evening calm, and the calm of a place likeBellwood is the peace of death without the hope of resurrection.

I walked slowly up the main street, which was lined with residences; thetown relegated its few shops to less desirable neighborhoods. My firstintention had been to see the Episcopal minister, but the rectory wasdark, and a burst of organ music from the church near reminded me againof the Sunday evening services.

Promiscuous inquiry was not advisable. So far, Miss Jane's disappearancewas known to very few, and Hunter had advised caution. I wandered up thestreet and turned at random to the right; a few doors ahead a newish redbrick building proclaimed itself the post-office, and gave the only signof life in the neighborhood. It occurred to me that here inside was theone individual who, theoretically at least, in a small place alwaysknows the idiosyncrasies of its people.

The door was partly open, for the spring night was sultry. Thepostmaster proved to be a one-armed veteran of the Civil War, and he wassorting rapidly the contents of a mail-bag, emptied on the counter.

"We don't sell stamps on Sunday nights," he explained, more politely."But if you're in a hurry for them—"

"I am," I lied. And after he had got them out, counting them with awrinkled finger, and tearing them off the sheet with the deliberation ofage, I opened a general conversation.

"I suppose you do a good bit of business here?" I asked. "It seems likea thriving place."

"Not so bad; big mail here sometimes. First of the quarter, when billsare coming round, we have a rush, and holidays and Easter we've got tohire an express wagon."

It was when I asked him about his empty sleeve, however, and he had toldme that he lost his arm at Chancellorsville, that we became reallyfriendly When he said he had been a corporal in General Maitland'scommand, my path was one of ease.

"The Maitland ladies! I should say I do," he said warmly. "I've beenfighting with Letitia Maitland as long as I can remember. That womanwill scrap with the angel Gabriel at the resurrection, if he wakes herup before she's had her sleep out."

"Miss Jane? She's an angel—she is that. She could have been married adozen times when she was a girl, but Letitia wouldn't have it. I wasafter her myself, forty-five years ago. This was the Maitland farm inthose days, and my father kept a country store down where the railroadstation is now."

"Wealthy! They don't know what they're worth—not that it matters a miteto Jane Maitland. She hasn't called her soul her own for so long that Iguess the good Lord won't hold her responsible for it."

All of which was entertaining, but it was much like an old-fashionedsee-saw; it kept going, but it didn't make much progress. But now atlast we took a step ahead.

"It's a shameful thing," the old man pursued, "that a woman as old asJane should have to get her letters surreptitiously. For more than ayear now she's been coming here twice a week for her mail, and I've beenkeeping it for her. Rain or shine, Mondays and Thursdays, she's beencoming, and a sight of letters she's been getting, too."

"Did she come last Thursday?" I asked over-eagerly. The postmaster, allat once, regarded me with suspicion.

"I don't know whether she did or not," he said coldly, and my furtherattempts to beguile him into conversation failed. I pocketed my stamps,and by that time his resentment at my curiosity was fading. He followedme to the door, and lowered his voice cautiously.

"Any news of the old lady?" he asked. "It ain't generally known aroundhere that she's missing, but Heppie, the cook there, is a relation of mywife's."

"I was tellin' the missus the other day," he said, "that there is an oldwalled-up cellar under the Maitland place. Have you looked there?" Hewas disappointed when I said we had, and I was about to go when hecalled me back.

"Miss Jane didn't get her mail on Thursday, but on Friday that niece ofhers came for it—two letters, one from the city and one from New York."

I walked past the Maitland place, but the windows were dark and thehouse closed. Haphazard inquiry being out of the question, I took theten o'clock train back to the city. I had learned little enough, andthat little I was at a loss to know how to use. For why had Margery gonefor Miss Jane's mailafter the little lady was missing? And why didMiss Jane carry on a clandestine correspondence?

The family had retired when I got home except Fred, who called from hisstudy to ask for a rhyme for mosque. I could not think of one andsuggested that he change the word to "temple." At two o'clock he bangedon my door in a temper, said he had changed the rhythm to fit, and nowcouldn't find a rhyme for "temple!" I suggested "dimple" drowsily,whereat he kicked the panel of the door and went to bed.

CHAPTER XIV

A WALK IN THE PARK

The funeral occurred on Monday. It was an ostentatious affair, with along list of honorary pall-bearers, a picked corps of city firemen inuniform ranged around the casket, and enough money wasted in floralpillows and sheaves of wheat tied with purple ribbon, to have given allthe hungry children in town a square meal.

Amid all this state Margery moved, stricken and isolated. She went tothe cemetery with Edith, Miss Letitia having sent a message that, havingnever broken her neck to see the man living, she wasn't going to do itto see him dead. The music was very fine, and the eulogy spoke of thispatriot who had served his country so long and so well. "Following theflag," Fred commented under his breath, "as long as there was anappropriation attached to it."

And when it was all over, we went back to Fred's until the Fleming housecould be put into order again. It was the best place in the world forMargery, for, with the children demanding her attention and applauseevery minute, she had no time to be blue.

Mrs. Butler arrived that day, which made Fred suspicious that Edith'splan to bring her, far antedated his consent. But she was there when wegot home from the funeral, and after one glimpse at her thin face andhollow eyes, I begged Edith to keep her away from Margery, for that dayat least.

Fortunately, Mrs. Butler was exhausted by her journey, and retired toher room almost immediately. I watched her slender figure go up thestairs, and, with her black trailing gown and colorless face, she was anembodiment of all that is lonely and helpless. Fred closed the doorbehind her and stood looking at Edith and me.

"I tell you, honey," he declared, "that brought into a cheerful homeis sufficient cause for divorce. Isn't it, Jack?"

"She is ill," Edith maintained valiantly. "She is my cousin, too, whichgives her some claim on me, and my guest, which gives her more."

"Lady-love," Fred said solemnly, "if you do not give me the key to thecellarette, I shall have a chill. And let me beg this of you: if I everget tired of this life, and shuffle off my mortality in a lumber yard,or a political club, and you go around like that, I shall haunt you. Iswear it."

From somewhere above, there came a sudden crash, followed by theannouncement, made by a scared housemaid, that Mrs. Butler had fainted.Fred sniffed as Edith scurried up-stairs.

"Hipped," he said shortly. "For two cents I'd go up and give her a goodwhiff of ammonia—not this aromatic stuff, but the genuine article. Thatwould make her sit up and take notice. Upon my word, I can't think whatpossessed Edith; these spineless, soft-spoken, timid women are leecheson one's sympathies."

But Mrs. Butler was really ill, and Margery insisted on looking afterher. It was an odd coincidence, the widow of one state treasurer and theorphaned daughter of his successor; both men had died violent deaths,in each case when a boiling under the political lid had threatened toblow it off.

The boys were allowed to have their dinner with the family that evening,in honor of Mrs. Butler's arrival, and it was a riotous meal. Margerygot back a little of her color. As I sat across from her, and watchedher expressions change, from sadness to resignation, and even graduallyto amusement at the boys' antics, I wondered just how much she knew, orsuspected, that she refused to tell me.

I remembered a woman—a client of mine—who said that whenever she satnear a railroad track and watched an engine thundering toward her, shetortured herself by picturing a child on the track, and wonderingwhether, under such circumstances, she would risk her life to save thechild.

I felt a good bit that way; I was firmly embarked on the case now, and Itortured myself with one idea. Suppose I should find Wardrop guilty, andI should find extenuating circumstances—what would I do? Publish thetruth, see him hanged or imprisoned, and break Margery's heart? Or keepback the truth, let her marry him, and try to forget that I had had ahand in the whole wretched business?

After all, I decided to try to stop my imaginary train. Prove Wardropinnocent, I reasoned with myself, get to the bottom of this thing, andthen—it would be man and man. A fair field and no favor. I suppose myproper attitude, romantically taken, was to consider Margery'sengagement ring an indissoluble barrier. But this was not romance; I wasfighting for my life happiness, and as to the ring—well, I am of theopinion that if a man really loves a woman, and thinks he can make herhappy, he will tell her so if she is strung with engagement rings to theends of her fingers. Dangerous doctrine? Well, this is not propaganda.

Tuesday found us all more normal. Mrs. Butler had slept some, and verycommendably allowed herself to be tea'd and toasted in bed. The boyswere started to kindergarten, after ten minutes of frenzied cap-hunting.Margery went with me along the hall when I started for the office.

"You have not learned anything?" she asked cautiously, glancing back toEdith, at the telephone calling the grocer frantically for the Mondaymorning supply of soap and starch.

"Not much," I evaded. "Nothing definite, anyhow. Margery, you are notgoing back to the Monmouth Avenue house again, are you?"

"Not just yet; I don't think I could. I suppose, later, it will have tobe sold, but not at once. I shall go to Aunt Letitia's first."

"Very well," I said. "Then you are going to take a walk with me thisafternoon in the park. I won't take no; you need the exercise, and Ineed—to talk to you," I finished lamely.

When she had agreed I went to the office. It was not much after nine,but, to my surprise, Burton was already there. He had struck up anacquaintance with Miss Grant, the stenographer, and that usually frigidperson had melted under the warmth of his red hair and his smile. Shewas telling him about her sister's baby having the whooping-cough, whenI went in.

"I wish I had studied law," he threw at me. "'What shall it profit a manto become a lawyer and lose his own soul?' as the psalmist says. I likethis ten-to-four business."

When we had gone into the inner office, and shut out Miss Grant and thewhooping-cough, he was serious instantly.

"Well," he said, sitting on the radiator and dangling his foot, "I guesswe've got Wardrop for theft, anyhow."

"Well, larceny, if you prefer legal terms. I found where he sold thepearls—in Plattsburg, to a wholesale jeweler named, suggestively,Cashdollar."

"Then," I said conclusively, "if he took the pearls and sold them, assure as I sit here, he took the money out of that Russia leather bag."

If he had any reason, he refused to give it. I told him, in my turn, ofCarter's escape, aided by the police, and he smiled. "For a suicide it'scausing a lot of excitement," he remarked. When I told him the littleincident of the post-office, he was much interested.

"The old lady's in it, somehow," he maintained. "She may have beenlending Fleming money, for one thing. How do you know it wasn't herhundred thousand that was stolen?"

"There's only one thing to do," Burton said finally, "and that is, findMiss Jane. If she's alive, she can tell something. I'll stake myfountain pen on that—and it's my dearest possession on earth, next tomy mother. If Miss Jane is dead—well, somebody killed her, and it'stime it was being found out."

"It's easy enough to find her," he exploded. "Make a noise about it;send up rockets. Put a half-column ad in every paper in town, or—betterstill—give the story to the reporters and let them find her for you.I'd do it, if I wasn't tied up with this Fleming case. Describe her, howshe walked, what she liked to eat, what she wore—in this case what shedidn't wear. Lord, I wish I had that assignment! In forty-eight hoursshe will have been seen in a hundred different places, and one of themwill be right. It will be a question of selection—that is, if she isalive."

In spite of his airy tone, I knew he was serious, and I felt he wasright. The publicity part of it I left to him, and I sent a specialdelivery that morning to Bellwood, asking Miss Letitia to say nothingand to refer reporters to me. I had already been besieged with them,since my connection with the Fleming case, and a few more made nodifference.

Burton attended to the matter thoroughly. The one o'clock edition of anafternoon paper contained a short and vivid scarlet account of MissJane's disappearance. The evening editions were full, and while vague asto the manner of her leaving, were minute as regarded her personalappearance and characteristics.

To escape the threatened inundation of the morning paper men, I left theoffice early, and at four o'clock Margery and I stepped from a hill carinto the park. She had been wearing a short, crepe-edged veil, but onceaway from the gaze of the curious, she took it off. I was glad to seeshe had lost the air of detachment she had worn for the last three days.

"Hold your shoulders well back," I directed, when we had found anisolated path, "and take long breaths. Try breathing in while I countten."

She was very tractable—unusually so, I imagined, for her. We swungalong together for almost a half-hour, hardly talking. I was contentmerely to be with her, and the sheer joy of the exercise after herenforced confinement kept her silent. When she began to flag a little Ifound a bench, and we sat down together. The bench had been latelypainted, and although it seemed dry enough, I spread my handkerchief forher to sit on. Whereupon she called me "Sir Walter," and at the familiarjest we laughed like a pair of children.

I had made the stipulation that, for this one time, her father's deathand her other troubles should be taboo, and we adhered to itreligiously. A robin in the path was industriously digging out a worm;he had tackled a long one, and it was all he could manage. He took theavailable end in his beak and hopped back with the expression of one whosets his jaws and determines that this which should be, is to be. Theworm stretched into a pinkish and attenuated line, but it neither brokenor gave.

"The robin is a parent," I reminded her. "It is precisely the same asFred, who twists, jerks, distorts and attenuates the English language inhis magazine work, in order to have bread and ice-cream and jelly cakefor his two blooming youngsters."

"I wish some one depended on me," she said pensively. "It's a terriblething to feel that it doesn't matter to any one—not vitally,anyhow—whether one is around or not. To have all my responsibilitiestaken away at once, and just to drift around, like this—oh, it'sdreadful."

"I didn't promise to be cheerful," she returned. "Besides my father,there was only one person in the world who cared about me, and I don'tknow where she is. Dear Aunt Jane!"

The sunlight caught the ring on her engagement finger, and she flushedsuddenly as she saw me looking at it. We sat there for a while sayingnothing; the long May afternoon was coming to a close. The paths beganto fill with long lines of hurrying home-seekers, their day in office orfactory at an end.

Margery got up at last and buttoned her coat. Then impulsively she heldout her hand to me.

"You have been more than kind to me," she said hurriedly. "You havetaken me into your home—and helped me through these dreadful days—andI will never forget it; never."

"I am not virtuous," I replied, looking down at her. "I couldn't helpit. You walked into my life when you came to my office—was it only lastweek? The evil days are coming, I suppose, but just now nothing mattersat all, save that you are you, and I am I."

She dropped her veil quickly, and we went back to the car. The prosaicworld wrapped us around again; there was a heavy odor of restaurantcoffee in the air; people bumped and jolted past us. To me they wereonly shadows; the real world was a girl in black and myself, and thegirl wore a betrothal ring which was not mine.

CHAPTER XV

FIND THE WOMAN

Mrs. Butler came down to dinner that night. She was more cheerful than Ihad yet seen her, and she had changed her mournful garments to somethinga trifle less depressing. With her masses of fair hair dressed high, andher face slightly animated, I realized what I had not done before—thatshe was the wreck of a very beautiful woman. Frail as she was, almostshrinkingly timid in her manner, there were times when she drew up hertall figure in something like its former stateliness. She had beautifuleyebrows, nearly black and perfectly penciled; they were almostincongruous in her colorless face.

She was very weak; she used a cane when she walked, and after dinner, inthe library, she was content to sit impassive, detached, propped withcushions, while Margery read to the boys in their night nursery andEdith embroidered.

Fred had been fussing over a play for some time, and he had gone to readit to some manager or other. Edith was already spending the royalties.

"We could go a little ways out of town," she was saying, "and we couldhave an automobile; Margery says theirs will be sold, and it willcertainly be a bargain. Jack, are you laughing at me?"

"Certainlynot," I replied gravely. "Dream on, Edith. Shall we trainthe boys as chauffeurs, or shall we buy in the Fleming man, also cheap."

"I am sure," Edith said aggrieved, "that it costs more for horse feedthis minute for your gray, Jack, than it would for gasolene."

Edith turned her back on me and sewed. Near me, Mrs. Butler hadlanguidly taken up the paper; suddenly she dropped it, and when Istooped and picked it up I noticed she was trembling.

"I'm glad, glad," she said. Then she grew weak and semi-hysterical,laughing and crying in the same breath. When she had been helpedup-stairs, for in her weakened state it had been more of a shock than werealized, Margery came down and we tried to forget the scene we had justgone through.

"I am glad Fred was not here," Edith confided to me. "Ellen is a lovelywoman, and as kind as she is mild; but in one of her—attacks, she is alittle bit trying."

It was strange to contrast the way in which the two women took theirsimilar bereavements. Margery represented the best type of normalAmerican womanhood; Ellen Butler the neurasthenic; she demandedeverything by her very helplessness and timidity. She was a constantdrain on Edith's ready sympathy. That night, while I closed thehouse—Fred had not come in—I advised her to let Mrs. Butler go back toher sanatorium.

At twelve-thirty I was still down-stairs; Fred was out, and I waitedfor him, being curious to know the verdict on the play. The bell rang afew minutes before one, and I went to the door; some one in thevestibule was tapping the floor impatiently with his foot. When I openedthe door, I was surprised to find that the late visitor was Wardrop.

He came in quietly, and I had a chance to see him well, under the halllight; the change three days had made was shocking. His eyes were sunkdeep in his head, his reddened lids and twitching mouth told of littlesleep, of nerves ready to snap. He was untidy, too, and a three days'beard hardly improved him.

"I'm glad it's you," he said, by way of greeting. "I was afraid you'dhave gone to bed."

"It's the top of the evening yet," I replied perfunctorily, as I led theway into the library. Once inside, Wardrop closed the door and lookedaround him like an animal at bay.

"I came here," he said nervously, looking at the windows, "because I hadan idea you'd keep your head. Mine's gone; I'm either crazy, or I'm onmy way there."

"Sit down, man," I pushed a chair to him. "You don't look as if you havebeen in bed for a couple of nights."

He went to each of the windows and examined the closed shutters beforehe answered me.

"I haven't. You wouldn't go to bed either, if you thought you wouldnever wake up."

"Well, it's true enough. Knox, there are people following me wherever Igo; they eat where I eat; if I doze in my chair they come into mydreams!" He stopped there, then he laughed a little wildly. "That lastisn't sane, but it's true. There's a man across the street now, eatingan apple under a lamppost."

"Suppose youare under surveillance," I said. "It's annoying to have adetective following you around, but it's hardly serious. The police saynow that Mr. Fleming killed himself; that was your own contention."

He leaned forward in his chair and, resting his hands on his knees,gazed at me somberly.

"Suppose I say he didn't kill himself?" slowly. "Suppose I say he wasmurdered? Suppose—good God—suppose I killed him myself?"

"For the last two days I've been wondering—if I did it! He hadn't anyweapon; I had one, his. I hated him that day; I had tried to save him,and couldn't. My God, Knox, I might have gone off my head and doneit—and not remember it. There have been cases like that."

His condition was pitiable. I looked around for some whisky, but thebest I could do was a little port on the sideboard. When I came back hewas sitting with bent head, his forehead on his palms.

"I've thought it all out," he said painfully. "My mother had spells ofemotional insanity. Perhaps I went there, without knowing it, and killedhim. I can see him, in the night, when I daren't sleep, toppling over onto that table, with a bullet wound in his head, and I am in the room,and I have his revolver in my pocket!"

"You give me your word you have no conscious recollection of hearing ashot fired."

"My word before Heaven," he said fervently. "But I tell you, Knox, hehad no weapon. No one came out of that room as I went in and yet he wasonly swaying forward, as if I had shot him one moment, and caught him ashe fell, the next. I was dazed; I don't remember yet what I told thepolice."

The expression of fear in his eyes was terrible to see. A gust of windshook the shutters, and he jumped almost out of his chair.

"You will have to be careful," I said. "There have been cases where menconfessed murders they never committed, driven by Heaven knows whatmethod of undermining their mental resistance. Yon expose yourimagination to 'third degree' torture of your own invention, and in twodays more you will be able to add full details of the crime."

"I knew you would think me crazy," he put in, a little less somberly,"but just try it once: sit in a room by yourself all day and all night,with detectives watching you; sit there and puzzle over a murder of aman you are suspected of killing; you know you felt like killing him,and you have a revolver, and he is shot. Wouldn't you begin to think asI do?"

"Wardrop," I asked, trying to fix his wavering eyes with mine, "do youown a thirty-two caliber revolver?"

I was startled beyond any necessity, under the circumstances. Manypeople have thirty-twos.

"That is, I had," he corrected himself. "It was in the leather bag thatwas stolen at Bellwood."

"I can relieve your mind of one thing," I said. "If your revolver wasstolen with the leather bag, you had nothing to do with the murder.Fleming was shot with a thirty-two." He looked first incredulous, thenrelieved.

"Now, then," I pursued, "suppose Mr. Fleming had an enemy, a relentlessone who would stoop to anything to compass his ruin. In his position hewould be likely to have enemies. This person, let us say, knows what youcarry in your grip, and steals it, taking away the funds that would havehelped to keep the lid on Fleming's mismanagement for a time. In thegrip is your revolver; would you know it again?"

"This person—this enemy finds the revolver, pockets it and at the firstopportunity, having ruined Fleming, proceeds humanely to put him out ofhis suffering. Is it far-fetched?"

"There were a dozen—a hundred—people who would have been glad to ruinhim." His gaze wavered again suddenly. It was evident that I had renewedan old train of thought.

"You forget one thing, Knox," he said, after a moment. "There was nobodyelse who could have shot him: the room was empty."

"There is no doubt in my mind that he was shot from there. He was facingthe open window, sitting directly under the light, writing. A shot firedthrough a broken pane of one of the warehouse windows would meet everyrequirement of the case: the empty room, the absence of powdermarks—even the fact that no shot was heard. There was a report, ofcourse, but the noise in the club-house and the thunder-storm outsidecovered it."

"By George!" he exclaimed. "The warehouse, of course. I never thought ofit." He was relieved, for some reason.

"It's a question now of how many people knew he was at the club, andwhich of them hated him enough to kill him."

"Because it was he who came to the door of the room while the detectiveand you and I were inside, and called Fleming."

I pulled out my pocket-book and took out the scrap of paper whichMargery had found pinned to the pillow in her father's bedroom. "Do youknow what that means?" I asked, watching Wardrop's face. "That was foundin Mr. Fleming's room two days after he left home. A similar scrap wasfound in Miss Jane Maitland's room when she disappeared. When Flemingwas murdered, he was writing a letter; he said: 'The figures havefollowed me here.' When we know what those figures mean, Wardrop, weknow why he was killed and who did it."

"I do not know," he said, and I believed him. He had got up and takenhis hat, but I stopped him inside the door.

"You can help this thing in two ways," I told him. "I am going to giveyou something to do: you will have less time to be morbid. Find out, ifyou can, all about Fleming's private life in the last dozen years,especially the last three. See if there are any women mixed up in it,and try to find out something about this eleven twenty-two."

"Eleven twenty-two," he repeated, but I had not missed his change ofexpression when I said women.

"Also," I went on, "I want you to tell me who was with you the night youtried to break into the house at Bellwood."

He was taken completely by surprise: when he had gathered himselftogether his perplexity was overdone.

He lost his composure altogether then. I put my back against the doorand waited for him to get himself in hand.

"There was a woman," I persisted, "and what is more, Wardrop, at thisminute you believe she took your Russia leather bag and left asubstitute."

"But she couldn't," he quavered. "I've thought until my brain is going,and I don't see how she could have done it."

He became sullen when he saw what he had done, refused any moreinformation, and left almost immediately.

CHAPTER XVI

ELEVEN TWENTY-TWO AGAIN

Burton's idea of exploiting Miss Jane's disappearance began to bearfruit the next morning. I went to the office early, anxious to get mymore pressing business out of the way, to have the afternoon with Burtonto inspect the warehouse. At nine o'clock came a call from the morgue.

"Small woman, well dressed, gray hair?" I repeated. "I think I'll go upand see. Where was the body found?"

"In the river at Monica Station," was the reply. "There is a scardiagonally across the cheek to the corner of the mouth."

With a breath of relief I said it was not the person we were seeking andtried to get down to work again. But Burton's prophecy had been right.Miss Jane had been seen in a hundred different places: one perhaps wasright; which one?

A reporter for theEagle had been working on the case all night: hecame in for a more detailed description of the missing woman, and he hada theory, to fit which he was quite ready to cut and trim the facts.

"It's Rowe," he said confidently. "You can see his hand in it rightthrough. I was put on the Benson kidnapping case, you remember, the boywho was kept for three months in a deserted lumber camp in themountains? Well, sir, every person in the Benson house swore thatyoungster was in bed at midnight, when the house was closed for thenight. Every door and window bolted in the morning, and the boy gone.When we found Rowe—after the mother had put on mourning—and found thekid, ten pounds heavier than he had been before he was abducted, andstrutting around like a turkey cock, Rowe told us that he and the boytook in the theater that night, and were there for the first act. Howdid he do it? He offered to take the boy to the show if he would pretendto go to bed, and then slide down a porch pillar and meet him. The boydidn't want to go home when we found him."

"There can't be any mistake about the time in this case," I commented."I saw her myself after eleven, and said good night."

TheEagle man consulted his note-book. "Oh, yes," he asked; "did shehave a diagonal cut across her cheek?"

My next visitor was a cabman. On the night in question he had taken asmall and a very nervous old woman to the Omega ferry. She appearedexcited and almost forgot to pay him. She carried a small satchel, andwore a black veil. What did she look like? She had gray hair, and sheseemed to have a scar on her face that drew the corner of her mouth.

At ten o'clock I telephoned Burton: "For Heaven's sake," I said, "ifanybody has lost a little old lady in a black dress, wearing a blackveil, carrying a satchel, and with a scar diagonally across her cheekfrom her eye to her mouth, I can tell them all about her, and where sheis now."

"That's funny," he said. "We're stirring up the pool and bringing upthings we didn't expect. The police have been looking for that womanquietly for a week: she's the widow of a coal baron, and herson-in-law's under suspicion of making away with her."

"Well, he didn't," I affirmed. "She committed suicide from an Omegaferry boat and she's at the morgue this morning."

"Bully," he returned. "Keep on; you'll get lots of clues, and rememberone will be right."

It was not until noon, however, that anything concrete developed. In thetwo hours between, I had interviewed seven more people. I had followedthe depressing last hours of the coal baron's widow, and jumped withher, mentally, into the black river that night. I had learned of a smallfairish-haired girl who had tried to buy cyanide of potassium at threedrug-stores on the same street, and of a tall light woman who had takena room for three days at a hotel and was apparently demented.

At twelve, however, my reward came. Two men walked in, almost at thesame time: one was a motorman, in his official clothes, brass buttonsand patches around the pockets. The other was a taxicab driver. Bothhad the uncertain gait of men who by occupation are unused to anythingstationary under them, and each eyed the other suspiciously.

The motorman claimed priority by a nose, so I took him first into myprivate office. His story, shorn of his own opinions at the time andlater, was as follows:

On the night in question, Thursday of the week before, he took his carout of the barn for the eleven o'clock run. Barney was his conductor.They went from the barn, at Hays Street, down-town, and then started outfor Wynton. The controller blew out, and two or three things went wrong:all told they lost forty minutes. They got to Wynton at five minutesafter two; their time there was one-twenty-five.

The car went to the bad again at Wynton, and he and Barney tinkered withit until two-forty. They got it in shape to go back to the barn, butthat was all. Just as they were ready to start, a passenger got on, awoman, alone: a small woman with a brown veil. She wore a black dress ora suit—he was vague about everything but the color, and he noticed herespecially because she was fidgety and excited. Half a block farther aman boarded the car, and sat across from the woman. Barney saidafterward that the man tried twice to speak to the woman, but she lookedaway each time. No, he hadn't heard what he said.

The man got out when the car went into the barn, but the woman stayedon. He and Barney got another car and took it out, and the woman wentwith them. She made a complete round trip this time, going out to Wyntonand back to the end of the line down-town. It was just daylight when shegot off at last, at First and Day Streets.

Asked if he had thought at the time that the veiled woman was young orold, he said he had thought she was probably middle-aged. Very young orvery old women would not put in the night riding in a street-car. Yes,he had had men who rode around a couple of times at night, mostly tosober up before they went home. But he never saw a woman do it before.

I took his name and address and thanked him. The chauffeur came next,and his story was equally pertinent.

On the night of the previous Thursday he had been engaged to take a sickwoman from a down-town hotel to a house at Bellwood. The woman's husbandwas with her, and they went slowly to avoid jolting. It was after twelvewhen he drove away from the house and started home. At a corner—he didnot know the names of the streets—a woman hailed the cab and asked himif he belonged in Bellwood or was going to the city. She had missed thelast train. When he told her he was going into town, she promptlyengaged him, and showed him where to wait for her, a narrow road off themain street.

"I waited an hour," he finished, "before she came; I dropped to sleep orI would have gone without her. About half-past one she came along, and agentleman with her. He put her in the cab, and I took her to the city.When I saw in the paper that a lady had disappeared from Bellwood thatnight, I knew right off that it was my party."

"I would know his voice, I expect, sir; I could not see much: he wore aslouch hat and had a traveling-bag of some kind."

"He didn't say much. Before he closed the door, he said, 'You have putme in a terrible position,' or something like that. From thetraveling-bag and all, I thought perhaps it was an elopement, and thelady had decided to throw him down."

"Was it a young woman or an old one," I asked again. This time thecabby's tone was assured.

"Young," he asserted, "slim and quick: dressed in black, with a blackveil. Soft voice. She got out at Market Square, and I have an idea shetook a cross-town car there."

"I hardly think it was Miss Maitland," I said. "She was past sixty, andbesides—I don't think she went that way. Still it is worth followingup. Is that all?"

He fumbled in his pocket, and after a minute brought up a small blackpocket-book and held it out to me. It was the small coin purse out of aleather hand-bag.

"She dropped this in the cab, sir," he said. "I took it home to themissus—not knowing what else to do with it. It had no money in it—onlythat bit of paper."

I opened the purse and took out a small white card, without engraving.On it was written in a pencil the figures: C 1122

CHAPTER XVII

HIS SECOND WIFE

When the cabman had gone, I sat down and tried to think things out. As Ihave said many times in the course of this narrative, I lackimagination: moreover, a long experience of witnesses in court hadtaught me the unreliability of average observation. The very fact thattwo men swore to having taken solitary women away from Bellwood thatnight, made me doubt if either one had really seen the missing woman.

Of the two stories, the taxicab driver's was the more probable, as faras Miss Jane was concerned. Knowing her child-like nature, her timidity,her shrinking and shamefaced fear of the dark, it was almost incrediblethat she would walk the three miles to Wynton, voluntarily, and fromthere lose herself in the city. Besides, such an explanation would notfit the blood-stains, or the fact that she had gone, as far as we couldfind out, in her night-clothes.

Still—she had left the village that night, either by cab or on foot. Ifthe driver had been correct in his time, however, the taxicab was almosteliminated; he said the woman got into the cab at one-thirty. It wasbetween one-thirty and one-forty-five when Margery heard the footstepsin the attic.

I think for the first time it came to me, that day, that there was atleast a possibility that Miss Jane had not been attacked, robbed orinjured: that she had left home voluntarily, under stress of greatexcitement. But if she had, why? The mystery was hardly less for beingstripped of its gruesome details. Nothing in my knowledge of the missingwoman gave me a clue. I had a vague hope that, if she had gonevoluntarily, she would see the newspapers and let us know where she was.

To my list of exhibits I added the purse with its inclosure. The secretdrawer of my desk now contained, besides the purse, the slip markedeleven twenty-two that had been pinned to Fleming's pillow; the similarscrap found over Miss Jane's mantel; the pearl I had found on the floorof the closet, and the cyanide, which, as well as the bullet, Burtonhad given me. Add to these the still tender place on my head whereWardrop had almost brained me with a chair, and a blue ankle, nowbecoming spotted with yellow, where I had fallen down the dumb-waiter,and my list of visible reminders of the double mystery grew to eight.

I was not proud of the part I had played. So far, I had blundered, itseemed to me, at every point where a blunder was possible. I had fallenover folding chairs and down a shaft; I had been a half-hour too late tosave Allan Fleming; I had been up and awake, and Miss Jane had got outof the house under my very nose. Last, and by no means least, I hadwaited thirty-five years to find the right woman, and when I found her,some one else had won her. I was in the depths that day when Burton camein.

He walked into the office jauntily and presented Miss Grant with a clubsandwich neatly done up in waxed paper. Then he came into my privateroom and closed the door behind him.

"Avaunt, dull care!" he exclaimed, taking in my dejected attitude andexhibits on the desk at a glance. "Look up and grin, my friend." He hadhis hands behind him.

"Grin, darn you," he said, and put something on the desk in front of me.It was a Russia leather bag.

"Where did you get it?" I exclaimed, incredulous. Burton fumbled withthe lock while he explained.

It was not locked, and I got it open in a minute. As I had expected, itwas empty.

"Then—perhaps Wardrop was telling the truth," I exclaimed. "By Jove,Burton, he was robbed by the woman in the cab, and he can't tell abouther on account of Miss Fleming! She made a haul, for certain."

I told him then of the two women who had left Bellwood on the night ofMiss Jane's disappearance, and showed him the purse and its inclosure.The C puzzled him as it had me. "It might be anything," he said as hegave it back, "from a book, chapter and verse in the Bible to aprescription for rheumatism at a drug-store. As to the lady in the cab,I think perhaps you are right," he said, examining the interior of thebag, where Wardrop's name in ink told its story. "Of course, we haveonly Wardrop's word that he brought the bag to Bellwood; if we grantthat we can grant the rest—that he was robbed, that the thief emptiedthe bag, and either took it or shipped it to Boston."

"It was a coincidence. There have been a shrewd lot of baggage thievesin two or three eastern cities lately, mostly Boston. The method, thepolice say, was something like this—one of them, the chief of the gang,would get a wagon, dress like an expressman and go round the depotslooking at baggage. He would make a mental note of the numbers, go awayand forge a check to match, and secure the pieces he had taken a fancyto. Then he merely drove around to headquarters, and the trunk wasrifled. The police got on, raided the place, and found, among others,our Russia leather bag. It was shipped back, empty, to the addressinside, at Bellwood."

"It came while I was lunching with Miss Letitia," he said easily. "We'revery chummy—thick as thieves. What I want to know is"—disregarding myastonishment—"where is the hundred thousand?"

"Did you ever hear of Anderson, the nerve specialist?" he asked, withoutapparent relevancy.

"I have been thinking of him," I answered. "If we could get Wardropthere, on some plausible excuse, it would take Anderson about tenminutes with his instruments and experimental psychology, to knoweverything Wardrop ever forgot."

"I'll go on one condition," Burton said, preparing to leave. "I'llpromise to get Wardrop and have him on the spot at two o'clockto-morrow, if you'll promise me one thing: if Anderson fixes me with hiseye, and I begin to look dotty and tell about my past life, I want youto take me by the flap of my ear and lead me gently home."

The recovery of the bag was only one of the many astonishing things thathappened that day and the following night. Hawes, who knew little ofwhat it all meant, and disapproved a great deal, ended that afternoon bylocking himself, blinking furiously, in his private office. To Hawes anypractice that was not lucrative was bad practice. About four o'clock,when I had shut myself away from the crowd in the outer office, and wasletting Miss Grant take their depositions as to when and where they hadseen a little old lady, probably demented, wandering around the streets,a woman came who refused to be turned away.

"Young woman," I heard her say, speaking to Miss Grant, "he may haveimportant business, but I guess mine's just a little more so."

I interfered then, and let her come in. She was a woman of mediumheight, quietly dressed, and fairly handsome. My first impression wasfavorable; she moved with a certain dignity, and she was not laced,crimped or made up. I am more sophisticated now; The Lady Who Tells MeThings says that the respectable women nowadays, out-rouge, out-crimpand out-lace the unrespectable.

However, the illusion was gone the moment she began to speak. Her voicewas heavy, throaty, expressionless. She threw it like a weapon: I amperfectly honest in saying that for a moment the surprise of her voiceoutweighed the remarkable thing she was saying.

"I beg your pardon," I said, after a minute. "You mean—the AllanFleming who has just died?"

She nodded. I could see she was unable, just then, to speak. She hadnerved herself to the interview, but it was evident that there was areal grief. She fumbled for a black-bordered handkerchief, and herthroat worked convulsively. I saw now that she was in mourning.

"He married me three years ago, in Plattsburg. I came from there lastnight. I—couldn't leave before."

"No. Nobody knew about it. I have had to put up with a great deal, Mr.Knox. It's a hard thing for a woman to know that people are talkingabout her, and all the time she's married as tight as ring and book cando it."

"Estate!" Her tone was scornful. "I guess I'll take what's coming to me,as far as that goes—and it won't be much. No, I came to ask what theymean by saying Allan Fleming killed himself."

"I know he did not," she said tensely. "Not only that: I know who didit. It was Schwartz—Henry Schwartz."

"You don't know Schwartz," she said grimly. "I was married to him forfifteen years. I took him when he had a saloon in the Fifth Ward, atPlattsburg. The next year he was alderman: I didn't expect in those daysto see him riding around in an automobile—not but what he was makingmoney—Henry Schwartz is a money-maker. That's why he's boss of thestate now."

"He was a brute," she said vindictively. "He wanted me to go back tohim, and I told him I would rather die. I took a big house, and keptbachelor suites for gentlemen. Mr. Fleming lived there, and—he marriedme three years ago. He and Schwartz had to stand together, but theyhated each other."

"Schwartz?" I meditated. "Do you happen to know if Senator Schwartz wasin Plattsburg at the time of the mur—of Mr. Fleming's death?"

"He had already tried to kill him, the day we were married. He stabbedhim twice, but not deep enough."

I looked at her in wonder. For this woman, not extraordinarily handsome,two men had fought and one had died—according to her story.

"I can prove everything I say," she went on rapidly. "I have lettersfrom Mr. Fleming telling me what to do in case he was shot down;I have papers—canceled notes—that would put Schwartz in thepenitentiary—that is," she said cunningly, "I did have them. Mr.Fleming took them away."

"Yes, I'm afraid—afraid he'll get me back yet. It would please him tosee me crawl back on my knees."

"Yes, he can," she shivered. From which I knew she had told me only apart of her story.

After all she had nothing more to tell. Fleming had been shot; Schwartzhad been in the city about the Borough Bank; he had threatened Flemingbefore, but a political peace had been patched; Schwartz knew the WhiteCat. That was all.

"I know a lot about inside politics," she said, as she got up. "I haveseen the state divided up with the roast at my table, and served aroundwith the dessert, and I can tell you something you don't know aboutyour White Cat. A back staircase leads to one of the up-stairs rooms,and shuts off with a locked door. It opens below, out a side entrance,not supposed to be used. Only a few know of it. Henry Butler was founddead at the foot of that staircase."

"The police said so," she replied, with her grim smile. "There is such athing as murdering a man by driving him to suicide."

"Just a minute," I said, as she was about to go. "Have you ever heardMr. Fleming speak of the Misses Maitland?"

"They were—his first wife's sisters. No, he never talked of them, butI believe, just before he left Plattsburg, he tried to borrow some moneyfrom them."

"There is something else," I said. "Did you ever hear of the numbereleven twenty-two?"

It seemed rather ridiculous, when she had gone, and I sat down to thinkit over. It was anticlimax, to say the least. If the mysterious numbermeant only the address of this very ordinary woman, then—it wasprobable her story of Schwartz was true enough. But I could notreconcile myself to it, nor could I imagine Schwartz, with his greatbulk, skulking around pinning scraps of paper to pillows.

It would have been more like the fearlessness and passion of the man tohave shot Fleming down in the state house corridor, or on the street,and to have trusted to his influence to set him free. For the first timeit occurred to me that there was something essentially feminine in therevenge of the figures that had haunted the dead man.

That night, at the most peaceful spot I had ever known, Fred's home,occurred another inexplicable affair, one that left us all with rackednerves and listening, fearful ears.

CHAPTER XVIII

EDITH'S COUSIN

That was to be Margery's last evening at Fred's. Edith had kept her aslong as she could, but the girl felt that her place was with MissLetitia. Edith was desolate.

"I don't know what I am going to do without you," she said that nightwhen we were all together in the library, with a wood fire, for lightand coziness more than heat. Margery was sitting before the fire, andwhile the others talked she sat mostly silent, looking into the blaze.

The May night was cold and rainy, and Fred had been reading us a poem hehad just finished, receiving with indifference my comment on it, andbasking in Edith's rapture.

"If it's about anything, it isn't poetry," he replied. "Poetry appealsto the ear: it is primarily sensuous. If it is more than that it ceasesto be poetry and becomes verse."

"I'm afraid I'm getting old," she said, "I'm getting the nap habit afterdinner. Fred, run up, will you, and see if Katie put blankets over theboys?"

Fred stuffed his poem in his pocket and went resignedly up-stairs. Edithyawned again, and prepared to retire to the den for forty winks.

"If Ellen decides to come down-stairs," she called back over hershoulder, "please come and wake me. She said she felt better and mightcome down."

At the door she turned, behind Margery's back, and made me a sweepingand comprehensive signal. She finished it off with a double wink, Edithhaving never been able to wink one eye alone, and crossing the hall,closed the door of the den with an obtrusive bang.

Margery and I were alone. The girl looked at me, smiled a little, anddrew a long breath.

"It's queer about Edith," I said; "I never before knew her to get drowsyafter dinner. If she were not beyond suspicion, I would think it adeep-laid scheme, and she and Fred sitting and holding hands in acorner somewhere."

"But why—a scheme?" She had folded her hands in her lap, and theeternal ring sparkled malignantly.

Perhaps I was morbid about the ring: it seemed to me she lifted her handand looked at it.

"It's drafty in here: don't you think so?" she asked suddenly, lookingback of her. Probably she had not meant it, but I got up and closed thedoor into the hall. When I came back I took the chair next to her, andfor a moment we said nothing. The log threw out tiny red devil sparks,and the clock chimed eight, very slowly.

"I'm not afraid to see him," she said proudly, "and he ought not to beafraid to see me."

"I want to tell you something before you see him. Last night, before hecame, I thought that—well, that at least he knew something of—thethings we want to know."

"In justice to him, and because I want to fight fair, I tell youto-night that I don't believe he knows anything about your father'sdeath, and that I believe he was robbed that night at Bellwood."

"I think when the proper time comes, he will tell about that too,Margery." I did not notice my use of her name until too late. If sheheard, she failed to resent it. "After all, if you love him, hardlyanything else matters, does it? How do we know but that he was introuble, and that Aunt Jane herself gave them to him?"

"I won't run a race with a man who is lame," I said quietly. "Ethically,I ought to go away and leave you to your dreams, but I am not going todo it. If you love Wardrop as a woman ought to love the man she marries,then marry him and I hope you will be happy. If you don't—no, let mefinish. I have made up my mind to clear him if I can: to bring him toyou with a clear slate. Then, I know it is audacious, but I am going tocome, too, and—I'm going to plead for myself then, unless you send meaway."

She sat with her head bent, her color coming and going nervously. Nowshe looked up at me with what was the ghost of a smile.

"It sounds like a threat," she said in a low voice. "And you—I wonderif you always get what you want?"

Then, of course, Fred came in, and fell over a hassock looking formatches. Edith opened the door of the den and called him to herirritably, but Fred declined to leave the wood fire, and settled downin his easy chair. After a while Edith came over and joined us, but shesnubbed Fred the entire evening, to his bewilderment. And whenconversation lagged, during the evening that followed, I tried toremember what I had said, and knew I had done very badly. Only one thingcheered me: she had not been angry, and she had understood. Blessed bethe woman that understands!

We broke up for the night about eleven. Mrs. Butler had come down for awhile, and had even played a little, something of Tschaikovsky's, asinging, plaintive theme that brought sadness back into Margery's face,and made me think, for no reason, of a wet country road and a plodding,back-burdened peasant.

Fred and I sat in the library for a while after the rest had gone, and Itold him a little of what I had learned that afternoon.

"A second wife!" he said, "and a primitive type, eh? Well, did she shoothim, or did Schwartz? The Lady or the Democratic Tiger?"

Fred closed the house with his usual care. It required the combinedefforts of the maids followed up by Fred, to lock the windows, it beinghis confident assertion that in seven years of keeping house, he hadnever failed to find at least one unlocked window.

On that night, I remember, he went around with his usual scrupulouscare. Then we went up to bed, leaving a small light at the telephone inthe lower hall: nothing else.

The house was a double one, built around a square hall below, whichserved the purpose of a general sitting-room. From the front door ashort, narrow hall led back to this, with a room on either side, andfrom it doors led into the rest of the lower floor. At one side thestairs took the ascent easily, with two stops for landings, andup-stairs the bedrooms opened from a similar, slightly smaller squarehall. The staircase to the third floor went up from somewhere back inthe nursery wing.

My bedroom was over the library, and Mrs. Butler and Margery Fleming hadconnecting rooms, across the hall. Fred and Edith slept in the nurserywing, so they would be near the children. In the square upper hall therewas a big reading table, a lamp, and some comfortable chairs. Here, whenthey were alone, Fred read aloud the evening paper, or his latest shortstory, and Edith's sewing basket showed how she put in what womenmiscall their leisure.

I did not go to sleep at once: naturally the rather vital step I hadtaken in the library insisted on being considered and almost regretted.I tried reading myself to sleep, and when that failed, I tried thesoothing combination of a cigarette and a book. That worked like acharm; the last thing I remember is of holding the cigarette in a deathgrip as I lay with my pillows propped back of me, my head to the light,and a delightful languor creeping over me.

I was wakened by the pungent acrid smell of smoke, and I sat up andblinked my eyes open. The side of the bed was sending up a steady columnof gray smoke, and there was a smart crackle of fire under me somewhere.I jumped out of bed and saw the trouble instantly. My cigarette haddropped from my hand, still lighted, and as is the way with cigarettes,determined to burn to the end. In so doing it had fired my bed, the rugunder the bed and pretty nearly the man on the bed.

It took some sharp work to get it all out without rousing the house.Then I stood amid the wreckage and looked ruefully at Edith's prettyroom. I could see, mentally, the spot of water on the library ceilingthe next morning, and I could hear Fred's strictures on the heedlessnessand indifference to property of bachelors in general and me inparticular.

Three pitchers of water on the bed had made it an impossible couch. Iput on a dressing-gown, and, with a blanket over my arm, I went out tohunt some sort of place to sleep. I decided on the davenport in the halljust outside, and as quietly as I could, I put a screen around it andsettled down for the night.

I was wakened by the touch of a hand on my face. I started, I think, andthe hand was jerked away—I am not sure: I was still drowsy. I lay veryquiet, listening for footsteps, but none came. With the feeling thatthere was some one behind the screen, I jumped up. The hall was darkand quiet. When I found no one I concluded it had been only a vividdream, and I sat down on the edge of the davenport and yawned.

I heard Edith moving back in the nursery: she has an uncomfortable habitof wandering around in the night, covering the children, closingwindows, and sniffing for fire. I was afraid some of the smoke from myconflagration had reached her suspicious nose, but she did not come intothe front hall. I was wide-awake by that time, and it was then, I think,that I noticed a heavy, sweetish odor in the air. At first I thought oneof the children might be ill, and that Edith was dosing him with one ofthe choice concoctions that she kept in the bath-room medicine closet.When she closed her door, however, and went back to bed, I knew I hadbeen mistaken.

The sweetish smell was almost nauseating. For some reason orother—association of certain odors with certain events—I found myselfrecalling the time I had a wisdom tooth taken out, and that when I camearound I was being sat on by the dentist and his assistant, and thelatter had a black eye. Then, suddenly, I knew. The sickly odor waschloroform!

I had the light on in a moment, and was rapping at Margery's door. Itwas locked, and I got no answer. A pale light shone over the transom,but everything was ominously quiet, beyond the door. I went to Mrs.Butler's door, next; it was unlocked and partly open. One glance at theempty bed and the confusion of the place, and I rushed without ceremonythrough the connecting door into Margery's room.

The atmosphere was reeking with chloroform. The girl was in bed,apparently sleeping quietly. One arm was thrown up over her head, andthe other lay relaxed on the white cover. A folded towel had been laidacross her face, and when I jerked it away I saw she was breathing veryslowly, stertorously, with her eyes partly open and fixed.

I threw up all the windows, before I roused the family, and as soon asEdith was in the room I telephoned for the doctor. I hardly rememberwhat I did until he came: I know we tried to rouse Margery and failed,and I know that Fred went down-stairs and said the silver was intact andthe back kitchen door open. And then the doctor came, and I was put outin the hall, and for an eternity, I walked up and down, eight steps oneway, eight steps back, unable to think, unable even to hope.

Not until the doctor came out to me, and said she was better, and wouldI call a maid to make some strong black coffee, did I come out of mystupor. The chance of doing something, anything, made me determine tomake the coffee myself. They still speak of that coffee at Fred's.

It was Edith who brought Mrs. Butler to my mind. Fred had maintainedthat she had fled before the intruders, and was probably in some closetor corner of the upper floor. I am afraid our solicitude was long incoming. It was almost an hour before we organized a searching party tolook for her. Fred went up-stairs, and I took the lower floor.

It was I who found her, after all, lying full length on the grass in thelittle square yard back of the house. She was in a dead faint, and shewas a much more difficult patient than Margery.

We could get no story from either of them that night. The two rooms hadbeen ransacked, but apparently nothing had been stolen. Fred vowed hehad locked and bolted the kitchen door, and that it had been opened fromwithin.

It was a strange experience, that night intrusion into the house,without robbery as a motive. If Margery knew or suspected the reason forthe outrage, she refused to say. As for Mrs. Butler, to mention theoccurrence put her into hysteria. It was Fred who put forth the moststartling theory of the lot.

"By George," he said the next morning when we had failed to find tracksin the yard, and Edith had reported every silver spoon in its place, "byGeorge, it wouldn't surprise me if the lady in the grave clothes did itherself. There isn't anything a hysterical woman won't do to rouse yourinterest in her, if it begins to flag. How did any one get in throughthat kitchen door, when it was locked inside and bolted? I tell you, sheopened it herself."

I did not like to force Margery's confidence, but I believed that theoutrage was directly for the purpose of searching her room, perhaps forpapers that had been her father's. Mrs. Butler came around enough bymorning, to tell a semi-connected story in which she claimed that twomen had come in from a veranda roof, and tried to chloroform her. Thatshe had pretended to be asleep and had taken the first opportunity,while they were in the other room, to run down-stairs and into the yard.Edith thought it likely enough, being a credulous person.

As it turned out, Edith's intuition was more reliable than myskepticism,—or Fred's.

CHAPTER XIX

BACK TO BELLWOOD

The inability of Margery Fleming to tell who had chloroformed her, andMrs. Butler's white face and brooding eyes made a very respectablemystery out of the affair. Only Fred, Edith and I came down to breakfastthat morning. Fred's expression was half amused, half puzzled. Edithfluttered uneasily over the coffee machine, her cheeks as red as the bowof ribbon at her throat. I was preoccupied, and, like Fred, I proppedthe morning paper in front of me and proceeded to think in its shelter.

"Did you find anything, Fred?" Edith asked. Fred did not reply, so sherepeated the question with some emphasis.

"Yes, dear—that is, no. Nothing to amount to anything. Upon my soul,Jack, if I wrote the editorials of this paper, I'dsay something." Hesubsided into inarticulate growls behind the paper, and everything wasquiet. Then I heard a sniffle, distinctly. I looked up. Edith wascrying—pouring cream into a coffee cup, and feeling blindly for thesugar, with her pretty face twisted and her pretty eyes obscured. In asecond I was up, had crumpled the newspapers, including Fred's, into aball, and had lifted him bodily out of his chair.

"When I am married," I said fiercely, jerking him around to Edith andpushing him into a chair beside her, "if I ever read the paper atbreakfast when my wife is bursting for conversation, may I have somegood and faithful friend who will bring me back to a sense of my duty."I drew a chair to Edith's other side. "Now, let's talk," I said.

She wiped her eyes shamelessly with her table napkin. "There isn't asoul in this house I can talk to," she wailed. "All kinds of awfulthings happening—and we had to send for coffee this morning, Jack. Youmust have used four pounds last night—and nobody will tell me a thing.There's no use asking Margery—she's sick at her stomach from thechloroform—and Ellen never talks except about herself, and she'shorribly—uninteresting. And Fred and you make a ba—barricade out ofnewspapers, and fire 'yes' at me when you mean 'no.'"

"I put the coffee back where I got it, Edith," I protested stoutly. "Iknow we're barbarians, but I'll swear to that." And then I stopped, forI had a sudden recollection of going up-stairs with something fat andtinny in my arms, of finding it in my way, and of hastily thrusting itinto the boys' boot closet under the nursery stair.

Fred had said nothing. He had taken her hand and was patting it gently,the while his eye sought the head-lines on the wad of morning paper.

"You burned that blue rug," she said to me disconsolately, with a threatof fresh tears. "It took me ages to find the right shade of blue."

"Yes, to take away when you get married." There is a hint of the shrewin all good women.

Here, I regret to say, Edith suddenly laughed. She threw her head backand jeered at me.

"You!" she chortled, and pointed one slim finger at me mockingly. "You,who are so mad about one girl that you love all women for her sake! You,who go white instead of red when she comes into the room! You, who havelet your practice go to the dogs to be near her, and then never speak toher when she's around, but sit with your mouth open like a puppy beggingfor candy, ready to snap up every word she throws you and wiggle withjoy!"

"Honestly, Edith, do I do that?" I gasped. But she did not answer; sheonly leaned over and kissed Fred.

"Women like men to be awful fools about them," she said. "That's why I'mso crazy about Freddie." He writhed.

"Then—Margery's engagement ring was stolen last night and when Icommiserated her she said—dear me, the lamp's out and the coffee iscold!"

Edith rang the bell and seemed to be thinking. "Perhaps we'd better makeit four small rugs instead of one large one," she said.

"Oh, that! Why, she said it really didn't matter about the ring. She hadnever cared much about it anyway."

"But that's only a matter of taste," I protested, somewhat disappointed.But Edith got up and patted me on the top of my head.

"Silly," she said. "If the right man came along and gave her a rubberteething ring, she'd be crazy about it for his sake."

She took me up-stairs before I left for the office to measure for theShirvan, Edith being a person who believes in obtaining a thing whilethe desire for it is in its first bloom. Across the hall Fred wastalking to Margery through the transom.

"Mustard leaves are mighty helpful," he was saying. "I always take 'emon shipboard. And cheer up: land's in sight."

I would have given much for Fred's ease of manner when, a few minuteslater, Edith having decided on four Shirvans and a hall runner, she tookme to the door of Margery's room.

She was lying very still and pale in the center of the white bed, andshe tried bravely to smile at us.

"I hope you are better," I said. "Don't let Edith convince you that mycoffee has poisoned you."

She said she was a little better, and that she didn't know she had hadany coffee. That was the extent of the conversation. I, who have a localreputation of a sort before a jury, I could not think of another word tosay. I stood there for a minute uneasily, with Edith poking me with herfinger to go inside the door and speak and act like an intelligent humanbeing. But I only muttered something about a busy day before me andfled. It was a singular thing, but as I stood in the doorway, I had avivid mental picture of Edith's description of me, sitting up puppy-liketo beg for a kind word, and wiggling with delight when I got it. If Islunk into my office that morning like a dog scourged to his kennel,Edith was responsible.

At the office I found a note from Miss Letitia, and after a glance at itI looked for the first train, in my railroad schedule. The note wasbrief; unlike the similar epistle I had received from Miss Jane the dayshe disappeared, this one was very formal.

I had an appointment with Burton for the afternoon, to take Wardrop, ifwe could get him on some pretext, to Doctor Anderson. That day, also, Ihad two cases on the trial list. I got Humphreys, across the hall, totake them over, and evading Hawes' resentful blink, I went on my way toBellwood. It was nine days since Miss Jane had disappeared. On my wayout in the train I jotted down the things that had happened in thattime: Allan Fleming had died and been buried; the Borough Bank hadfailed; some one had got into the Fleming house and gone through thepapers there; Clarkson had killed himself; we had found that Wardrop hadsold the pearls; the leather bag had been returned; Fleming's secondwife had appeared, and some one had broken into my own house and,intentionally or not, had almost sent Margery Fleming over theborderland.

It seemed to me everything pointed in one direction, to a malignityagainst Fleming that extended itself to the daughter. I thought of whatthe woman who claimed to be the dead man's second wife had said the daybefore. If the staircase she had spoken of opened into the room whereFleming was shot, and if Schwartz was in town at the time, then, in viewof her story that he had already tried once to kill him, the likelihoodwas that Schwartz was at least implicated.

If Wardrop knew that, why had he not denounced him? Was I to believethat, after all the mystery, the number eleven twenty-two was to resolveitself into the number of a house? Would it be typical of the Schwartz Iknew to pin bits of paper to a man's pillow? On the other hand, if hehad reason to think that Fleming had papers that would incriminate him,it would be like Schwartz to hire some one to search for them, and hewould be equal to having Wardrop robbed of the money he was taking toFleming.

Granting that Schwartz had killed Fleming—then who was the woman withWardrop the night he was robbed? Why did he take the pearls and sellthem? How did the number eleven twenty-two come into Aunt Jane'spossession? How did the leather bag get to Boston? Who had chloroformedMargery? Who had been using the Fleming house while it was closed? Mostimportant of all now—where was Aunt Jane?

The house at Bellwood looked almost cheerful in the May sunshine, as Iwent up the walk. Nothing ever changed the straight folds of theold-fashioned lace curtains; no dog ever tracked the porch, or buriedsacrilegious and odorous bones on the level lawn; the birds were nestingin the trees, well above the reach of Robert's ladder, but they weredecorous, well-behaved birds, whose prim courting never partook of theexuberance of their neighbors', bursting their little throats in an elmabove the baby perambulator in the next yard.

When Bella had let me in, and I stood once more in the straight hall,with the green rep chairs and the Japanese umbrella stand, involuntarilyI listened for the tap of Miss Jane's small feet on the stairs. Insteadcame Bella's heavy tread, and a request from Miss Letitia that I goup-stairs.

The old lady was sitting by a window of her bedroom, in a chintzupholstered chair. She did not appear to be feeble; the only change Inoticed was a relaxation in the severe tidiness of her dress. I guessedthat Miss Jane's exquisite neatness had been responsible for the whiteruchings, the soft caps, and the spotless shoulder shawls which hadmade lovely their latter years.

"You've taken your own time about coming, haven't you?" Miss Letitiaasked sourly. "If it hadn't been for that cousin of yours you sent here,Burton, I'd have been driven to sending for Amelia Miles, and when Isend for Amelia Miles for company, I'm in a bad way."

"I have had a great deal to attend to," I said as loud as I could. "Icame some days ago to tell you Mr. Fleming was dead; after that we hadto bury him, and close the house. It's been a very sad—"

"Did he leave anything?" she interrupted. "It isn't sad at all unless hedidn't leave anything."

"He left very little. The house, perhaps, and I regret to have to tellyou that a woman came to me yesterday who claims to be a second wife."

"Then," she said with a snap, "there's one other woman in the world asbig a fool as my sister Martha was. I didn't know there were two of 'em.What do you hear about Jane?"

"The last time I was here," I shouted, "you thought she was dead; haveyou changed your mind?"

"The last time you were here," she said with dignity, "I thought a goodmany things that were wrong. I thought I had lost some of the pearls,but I hadn't."

"What!" I exclaimed incredulously. She put her hands on the arms of herchair, and leaning forward, shot the words at me viciously.

She didn't expect me to believe her, any more than she believed itherself. But why on earth she had changed her attitude about the pearlswas beyond me. I merely nodded comprehensively.

"Very well," I said, "I'm glad to know it was a mistake. Now, the nextthing is to find Miss Jane."

"Found her!" This time I did get out of my chair. "What on earth do youmean, Miss Letitia? Why, we've been scouring the country for her."

She opened a religious monthly on the table beside her, and took out afolded paper. I had to control my impatience while she changed herglasses and read it slowly.

"Heppie found it on the back porch, under a milk bottle," she prefaced.Then she read it to me. I do not remember the wording, and Miss Letitiarefused, both then and later, to let it out of her hands. As a result,unlike the other manuscripts in the case, I have not even a copy. Thesubstance, shorn of its bad spelling and grammar, was this:

The writer knew where Miss Jane was; the inference being that he wasresponsible. She was well and happy, but she had happened to read anewspaper with an account of her disappearance, and it had worried her.The payment of the small sum of five thousand dollars would send herback as well as the day she left. The amount, left in a tin can on thebase of the Maitland shaft in the cemetery, would bring the missing ladyback within twenty-four hours. On the contrary, if the recipient of theletter notified the police, it would go hard with Miss Jane.

"What do you think of it?" she asked, looking at me over her glasses."If she was fool enough to be carried away by a man that spells cemeterywith one m, she deserves what she's got. And I won't pay five thousand,anyhow, it's entirely too much."

"It doesn't sound quite genuine to me," I said, reading it over. "Ishould certainly not leave any money until we had tried to find who leftthis."

"I'm not so sure but what she'd better stay a while anyhow," MissLetitia pursued. "Now that we know she's living, I ain't so particularwhen she gets back. She's been notionate lately anyhow."

I had been reading the note again. "There's one thing here that makes medoubt the whole story," I said. "What's this about her reading thepapers? I thought her reading glasses were found in the library."

"Reading the paper!" she sniffed. "You've got more sense than I've beengiving you credit for, Knox. Her glasses are here this minute; withoutthem she can't see to scratch her nose."

It was a disappointment to me, although the explanation was simpleenough. It was surprising that we had not had more attempts to play onour fears. But the really important thing bearing on Miss Jane'sdeparture was when Heppie came into the room, with her apron turned uplike a pocket and her dust cap pushed down over her eyes like the slouchhat of a bowery tough.

When she got to the middle of the room she stopped and abruptly droppedthe corners of her apron. There rolled out a heterogeneous collection ofthings: a white muslin garment which proved to be a nightgown, with longsleeves and high collar; a half-dozen hair curlers—I knew those; Edithhad been seen, in midnight emergencies, with her hair twisted aroundjust such instruments of torture—a shoe buttoner; a railroad map, andone new and unworn black kid glove.

Miss Letitia changed her glasses deliberately, and took a comprehensivesurvey of the things on the floor.

"I found 'em stuffed under the blankets in the chest of drawers in theattic," Heppie shouted at her. "If we'd washed blankets last week, as Iwanted to—"

"Shut up!" Miss Letitia said shortly, and Heppie's thin lips closed witha snap. "Now then, Knox, what do you make of that?"

"If that's the nightgown she was wearing the night she disappeared, Ithink it shows one thing very clearly, Miss Maitland. She was notabducted, and she knew perfectly well what she was about. None of herclothes was missing, and that threw us off the track; but look at thisnew glove! She may have had new things to put on and left the old. Themap—well, she was going somewhere, with a definite purpose. When wefind out what took her away, we will find her."

"I don't believe a word of it," the old lady burst out. "She didn't havea secret; she was the kind that couldn't keep a secret. She wasn'tresponsible, I tell you; she was extravagant. Look at that glove! Andshe had three pairs half worn in her bureau."

"Just the number, eleven twenty-two," I repeated. "Does it mean anythingto you? Has it any significance?"

"I should say it has," she retorted. "In the last ten years the ColoredOrphans' Home has cared for, fed, clothed, and pampered exactly elevenhundred and twenty-two colored children, of every condition of shape andmisshape, brains and no brains."

"Eleven twenty-two? Twice eleven is twenty-two, if that's any help. No,I can't think of anything. I loaned Allan Fleming a thousand dollarsonce; I guess my mind was failing. It would be about eleven twenty-twoby this time."

Neither of which explanations sufficed for the little scrap found inMiss Jane's room. What connection, if any, had it with her flight? Wherewas she now. What was eleven twenty-two? And why did Miss Letitia denythat she had lost the pearls, when I already knew that nine of the tenhad been sold, who had bought them, and approximately how much he hadpaid?

CHAPTER XX

ASSOCIATION OF IDEAS

I ate a light lunch at Bellwood, alone, with Bella to look after me inthe dining-room. She was very solicitous, and when she had brought mytea, I thought she wanted to say something. She stood awkwardly near thedoor, and watched me.

"She was not very well this morning, but I don't think it is serious,Bella," I replied. She turned to go, but I fancied she hesitated.

"Oh, Bella," I called, as she was going out, "I want to ask yousomething. The night at the Fleming home, when you and I watched thehouse, didn't you hear some person running along the hall outside yourdoor? About two o'clock, I think?"

"You heard that?" I asked gently, "and yet you slept all night? Bella,there's a hitch somewhere. You didn't sleep that night, at all; you toldMiss Fleming I had been up all night. How did you know that? If I didn'tknow that you couldn't possibly get around as fast as the—person in thehouse that night, I would say you had been in Mr. Fleming's desk,looking for—let us say, postage stamps. May I have another cup ofcoffee?"

She turned a sickly yellow white, and gathered up my cup and saucer withtrembling hands. When the coffee finally came back it was broughtgrumblingly by old Heppie. "She says she's turned her ankle," shesniffed. "Turned it on a lathe, like a table leg, I should say, from theshape of it." Before I left the dining-room I put another line in mynote-book:

I got back to the city somewhat late for my appointment with Burton. Ifound Wardrop waiting for me at the office, and if I had been astonishedat the change in him two nights before, I was shocked now. He seemed tohave shrunk in his clothes; his eyeballs were bloodshot from drinking,and his fair hair had dropped, neglected, over his forehead. He wassitting in his familiar attitude, his elbows on his knees, his chin onhis palms.

He looked at me with dull eyes, when I went in. I did not see Burton atfirst. He was sitting on my desk, holding a flat can in his hand, anddigging out with a wooden toothpick one sardine after another andbolting them whole.

"Your good health," he said, poising one in the air, where it threatenedoily tears over the carpet. "As an appetite-quencher andthirst-producer, give me the festive sardine. How lovely it would be ifwe could eat 'em without smelling 'em!"

Burton eyed him reproachfully. "Is that what I get for doing withoutlunch, in order to prove to you that you are not crazy?" He appealed tome. "He says he's crazy—lost his think works. Now, I ask you, Knox,when I go to the trouble to find out for him that he's got as manyconvolutions as anybody, and that they've only got a little convolved,is it fair, I ask you, for him to reproach me about my food?"

"I didn't know you knew each other," I put in, while Burton took anothersardine.

"He says we do," Wardrop said wearily; "says he used to knock me aroundat college."

"He doesn't remember me, but he will," he said. "It's his nerves thatare gone, and we'll have him restrung with new wires, like an old piano,in a week."

Wardrop had that after-debauch suspicion of all men, but I think hegrasped at me as a dependability.

"He wants me to go to a doctor," he said. "I'm not sick; it's only—" Hewas trying to light a cigarette, but the match dropped from his shakingfingers.

"Better see one, Wardrop," I urged—and I felt mean enough about doingit. "You need something to brace you up."

Burton gave him a very small drink, for he could scarcely stand, and wewent down in the elevator. My contempt for the victim between us was asgreat as my contempt for myself. That Wardrop was in a bad positionthere could be no doubt; there might be more men than Fleming who hadknown about the money in the leather bag, and who thought he had takenit and probably killed Fleming to hide the theft.

It seemed incredible that an innocent man would collapse as he had done,and yet—at this minute I can name a dozen men who, under the club ofpublic disapproval, have fallen into paresis, insanity and the grave. Weare all indifferent to our fellow-men until they are against us.

Burton knew the specialist very well—in fact, there seemed to be fewpeople he did not know. And considering the way he had got hold of MissLetitia and Wardrop, it was not surprising. He had evidently arrangedwith the doctor, for the waiting-room was empty and we were afterhours.

The doctor was a large man, his size emphasized by the clothes he wore,very light in color, and unprofessional in cut. He was sandy-haired,inclined to be bald, and with shrewd, light blue eyes behind hisglasses. Not particularly impressive, except as to size, on firstacquaintance; a good fellow, with a brisk voice, and an amazingly lighttread.

He began by sending Wardrop into a sort of examining room in the rear ofthe suite somewhere, to take off his coat and collar. When he had gonethe doctor looked at a slip of paper in his hand.

"I think I've got it all from Mr. Burton," he said. "Of course, Mr.Knox, this is a little out of my line; a nerve specialist has as muchbusiness with psychotherapy as a piano tuner has with musical technique.But the idea is Munsterburg's, and I've had some good results. I'll givehim a short physical examination, and when I ring the bell one of youmay come in. Are you a newspaper man, Mr. Knox?"

"Press man, lawyer, or doctor," Burton broke in, "we all fatten on theother fellow's troubles, don't we?"

"I never saw a lawyer yet who would admit he was making money," he said."Look at the way a doctor grinds for a pittance! He's just as capable asthe lawyer; he works a damn sight harder, and he makes a tenth theincome. A man will pay his lawyer ten thousand dollars for keeping himout of jail for six months, and he'll kick like a steer if his doctorcharges him a hundred to keep him out of hell for life! Which of youwill come in? I'm afraid two would distract him."

"I guess it is Knox's butt-in," Burton conceded, "but I get it later,Doctor; you promised."

The physical examination was very brief; when I was called in Wardropwas standing at the window looking down into the street below, and thedoctor was writing at his desk. Behind Wardrop's back he gave me theslip he had written.

He drew a chair to the center-table for Wardrop, and another, justacross for himself. I sat back and to one side of the patient, where Icould see Wardrop's haggard profile and every movement of thespecialist.

On the table was an electric instrument like a small clock, and thedoctor's first action was to attach to it two wires with small, blackrubber mouthpieces.

"Now, Mr. Wardrop," he said, "we will go on with the test. Your othercondition is fair, as I told you; I think you can dismiss the idea ofinsanity without a second thought, but there is something more thanbrain and body to be considered; in other words, you have been through astorm, and some of your nervous wires are down. Put the mouthpiecebetween your lips, please; you see, I do the same with mine. And when Igive you a word, speak as quickly as possible the association it bringsto your mind. For instance, I say 'noise.' Your first association mightbe 'street,' 'band,' 'drum,' almost anything associated with the word.As quickly as possible, please."

The first few words went simply enough. Wardrop's replies came almostinstantly. To "light" he replied "lamp;" "touch" brought the response"hand;" "eat" brought "Burton," and both the doctor and I smiled.Wardrop was intensely serious. Then—

"Taxicab," said the doctor, and, after an almost imperceptible pause,"road" came the association. All at once I began to see thepossibilities.

"Head." After a perceptible pause the answer came uncertainly. "Hair."But the association of ideas would not be denied, for in answer to thenext word, which was "ice," he gave "blood," evidently following up theprevious word "head."

I found myself gripping the arms of my chair. The dial on the doctor'sclock-like instrument was measuring the interval; I could see that now.The doctor took a record of every word and its response. Wardrop's eyeswere shifting nervously.

"Traveling-bag." He brought out the word "train" after an evidentstruggle, but in answer to the next word "lost," instead of the obvious"found," he said "woman." He had not had sufficient mental agility toget away from the association with "bag." The "woman" belonged there.

"Murder" brought "dead," but "shot," following immediately after,brought "staircase."

I think Wardrop was on his guard by that time, but the conscious effortto hide truths that might be damaging made the intervals longer, fromthat time on. Already I felt sure that Allan Fleming's widow had beenright; he had been shot from the locked back staircase. But by whom?

Wardrop was going to the bad. When, to the next word, "staircase,"again, he said "scar," his demoralization was almost complete. As forme, the scene in Wardrop's mind was already in mine—Schwartz, with thescar across his ugly forehead, and the bolted door to the staircaseopen!

"Gate." He stopped here so long, I thought he was not going to answer atall. Presently, with am effort, he said "wood," but as before, theassociation idea came out in the next word; for "electric light" he gave"letters."

"Closet." After perhaps a second and a half came "dust," showing whatcloset was in his mind, and immediately after, to "match" he gave "pen."

A long list of words followed which told nothing, to my mind, althoughthe doctor's eyes were snapping with excitement. Then "traveling-bag"again, and instead of his previous association, "woman," this time hegave "yellow." But, to the next word, "house," he gave "guest." It cameto me that in his mental processes I was the guest, the substitute bagwas in his mind, as being in my possession. Quick as a flash the doctorfollowed up—

To a great many words, as I said before, I could attach no significance.Here and there I got a ray.

Eleven twenty-two C! He gave no evidence of having noticed anypeculiarity in what he said; I doubt if he realized his answer. To me,he gave the impression of repeating something he had apparentlyforgotten. As if a number and its association had been subconscious, andbrought to the surface by the psychologist; as if, for instance, someone prompted a—b, and the corollary "c" came without summoning.

The psychologist took the small mouthpiece from his lips, and motionedWardrop to do the same. The test was over.

"I don't call that bad condition, Mr.—Wardrop," the doctor said. "Youare nervous, and you need a little more care in your habits. You want toexercise, regularly, and you will have to cut out everything in the wayof stimulants for a while. Oh, yes, a couple of drinks a day at first,then one a day, and then none. And you are to stop worrying—whentrouble comes round, and stares at you, don't ask it in to have adrink. Take it out in the air and kill it; oxygen is as fatal to anxietyas it is to tuberculosis."

"Bellwood, of course," the doctor responded heartily. "Ten miles a day,four cigarettes, and three meals—which is more than you have beentaking, Mr. Wardrop, by two."

I put him on the train for Bellwood myself, and late that afternoon thethree of us—the doctor, Burton and myself—met in my office and wentover the doctor's record.

"When the answer comes in four-fifths of a second," he said, before webegan, "it is hardly worth comment. There is no time in such an intervalfor any mental reservation. Only those words that showed noticeablehesitation need be considered."

We worked until almost seven. At the end of that time the doctor leanedback in his chair, and thrust his hands deep in his trousers pockets.

"I got the story from Burton," he said, after a deep breath. "I had noconclusion formed, and of course I am not a detective. Things lookedblack for Mr. Wardrop, in view of the money lost, the quarrel withFleming that morning at the White Cat, and the circumstance of hisleaving the club and hunting a doctor outside, instead of raising thealarm. Still, no two men ever act alike in an emergency. Psychology isas exact a science as mathematics; it gets information from the source,and a man can not lie in four-fifths of a second. 'Head,' you noticed,brought 'hair' in a second and three quarters, and the next word, 'ice,'brought the 'blood' that he had held back before. That doesn't showanything. He tried to avoid what was horrible to him.

"But I gave him 'traveling-bag;' after a pause, he responded with'train.' The next word, 'lost,' showed what was in his mind; instead of'found,' he said 'woman.' Now then, I believe he was either robbed by awoman, or he thinks he was. After all, we can only get what he believeshimself.

"I learned yesterday of a back staircase that leads into one of theupper rooms," I said. "It opens on a side entrance, and is used inemergency."

"We look there for our criminal," he said. "Nothing hides from thechronoscope. Now then, 'staircase—scar.' Isn't that significant? Theassociation is clear: a scar that is vivid enough, disfiguring enough,to be the first thing that enters his mind."

"Schwartz!" Burton said with awe. "Doctor, what on earth does 'eleventwenty-two C' mean?"

"I think that is up to you, gentlemen. The C belongs there, withoutdoubt. Briefly, looking over these slips, I make it something like this:Wardrop thinks a woman took his traveling-bag. Three times he gave theword 'letters,' in response to 'gate,' 'guest' and 'money.' Did he havea guest at the time all this happened at Bellwood?"

"Yes. By Jove, I wonder if there is anything in it? I have reason toknow that he came into my room that night at least once after I wentasleep."

"I think it very likely," he said dryly. "One thing we have not touchedon, and I believe Mr. Wardrop knows nothing of it. That is, thedisappearance of the old lady. There is a psychological study for you!My conclusion? Well, I should say that Mr. Wardrop is not guilty of themurder. He knows, or thinks he knows, who is. He has a theory of hisown, about some one with a scar: it may be only a theory. He does notnecessarily know, but he hopes. He is in a state of abject fear. Also,he is hiding something concerning letters, and from the word 'money' inthat connection, I believe he either sold or bought some damagingpapers. He is not a criminal, but he is what is almost worse."

The doctor rose and picked up his hat. "He is a weakling," he said, fromthe doorway.

Burton looked at his watch. "By George!" he said. "Seven-twenty, andI've had nothing since lunch but a box of sardines. I'm off to chase thefestive mutton chop. Oh, by the way, Knox, where is that locked bag?"

"I'll drop around in the morning and assist you to compound a felony,"he said easily. But as it happened, he did not.

CHAPTER XXI

A PROSCENIUM BOX

I was very late for dinner. Fred and Edith were getting ready for aconcert, and the two semi-invalids were playing pinochle in Fred's den.Neither one looked much the worse for her previous night's experience;Mrs. Butler was always pale, and Margery had been so since her father'sdeath.

The game was over when I went into the den. As usual, Mrs. Butler leftthe room almost immediately, and went to the piano across the hall. Ihad grown to accept her avoidance of me without question. Fred said itwas because my overwhelming vitality oppressed her. Personally, I thinkit was because the neurasthenic type of woman is repulsive to me. Nodoubt Mrs. Butler deserved sympathy, but her open demand for it found mecold and unresponsive.

I told Margery briefly of my visit to Bellwood that morning. She was aspuzzled as I was about the things Heppie had found in the chest. Shewas relieved, too.

"I am just as sure, now, that she is living, as I was a week ago thatshe was dead," she said, leaning back in her big chair. "But whatterrible thing took her away? Unless—"

"She had loaned my father a great deal of money," Margery said, withheightened color. "She had not dared to tell Aunt Letitia, and the moneywas to be returned before she found it out. Then—things went wrong withthe Borough Bank, and—the money did not come back. If you know AuntJane, and how afraid she is of Aunt Letitia, you will understand howterrible it was for her. I have wondered if she would go—to Plattsburg,and try to find father there."

"TheEagle man is working on that theory now," I replied. "Margery, ifthere was a letter 'C' added to eleven twenty-two, would you know whatit meant?"

"I think I know who did it, but I don't understand. I have been tryingall day to think it out. I'm afraid to go to sleep to-night."

"You need not be," I assured her. "If necessary, we will have the citypolice in a ring around the house. If you know and don't tell, Margery,you are running a risk, and more than that, you are protecting a personwho ought to be in jail."

"Just what she said this morning. And she says valuable papers weretaken from under her pillow. She was very ill—hysterical, allafternoon."

The gloom and smouldering fire of theSonata Apassionata came to usfrom across the hall. I leaned over and took Margery's small handbetween my two big ones.

"Why don't you tell me?" I urged. "Or—you needn't tell me, I know whatyou think. But there isn't any motive that I can see, and why would shechloroform you?"

"I don't know," Margery shuddered. "Sometimes—I wonder—do you thinkshe is altogether sane?"

The music ended with the crash of a minor chord. Fred and Edith camedown the stairs, and the next moment we were all together, and thechance for a quiet conversation was gone. At the door Fred turned andcame back.

"Watch the house," he said. "And by the way, I guess"—he lowered hisvoice—"the lady's story was probably straight. I looked around againthis afternoon, and there are fresh scratches on the porch roof underher window. It looks queer, doesn't it?"

It was a relief to know that, after all, Mrs. Butler was an enemy and adangerous person to nobody but herself. She retired to her room almostas soon as Fred and Edith had gone. I was wondering whether or not totell Margery about the experiment that afternoon; debating how to askher what letters she had got from the postmaster at Bellwood addressedto Miss Jane, and what she knew of Bella. At the same time—bear withme, oh masculine reader, the gentle reader will, for she cares a greatdeal more for the love story than for all the crime and mystery puttogether—bear with me, I say, if I hold back the account of theterrible events that came that night, to tell how beautiful Margerylooked as the lamplight fell on her brown hair and pure profile, and howthe impulse came over me to kiss her as she sat there; and how I didn't,after all—poor gentle reader!—and only stooped over and kissed thepink palm of her hand.

She didn't mind it; speaking as nearly as possible from an impersonalstandpoint, I doubt if she was even surprised. You see, the ring wasgone and—it had only been an engagement ring anyhow, and everybodyknows how binding they are!

And then an angel with a burning sword came and scourged me out of myEden. And the angel was Burton, and the sword was a dripping umbrella.

"I hate to take you out," he said. "The bottom's dropped out of the sky;but I want you to make a little experiment with me." He caught sight ofMargery through the portières, and the imp of mischief in him promptedhis next speech. "She said she must see you," he said, very distinctly,and leered at me.

"Don't be an ass," I said angrily. "I don't know that I care to go outto-night."

"Let's go and take a look at the staircase you fellows have been talkingabout," he said. "I don't believe there is a staircase there, except themain one. I have hounded every politician in the city into or out ofthat joint, and I have never heard of it."

I felt some hesitation about leaving the house—and Margery—after theevents of the previous night. But Margery had caught enough of theconversation to be anxious to have me to go, and when I went in toconsult her she laughed at my fears.

"Lightning never strikes twice in the same place," she said bravely. "Iwill ask Katie to come down with me if I am nervous, and I shall wait upfor the family."

I went without enthusiasm. Margery's departure had been delayed for aday only, and I had counted on the evening with her. In fact, I had sentthe concert tickets to Edith with an eye single to that idea. ButBurton's plan was right. It was, in view of what we knew, to go over theground at the White Cat again, and Saturday night, with the place fullof men, would be a good time to look around, unnoticed.

"I don't hang so much to this staircase idea," Burton said, "and I havea good reason for it. I think we will find it is the warehouse, yet."

"You can depend on it, Burton," I maintained, "that the staircase is theplace to look. If you had seen Wardrop's face to-day, and his agony ofmind when he knew he had associated 'staircase' with 'shot,' you wouldthink just as I do. A man like Schwartz, who knew the ropes, could goquietly up the stairs, unbolt the door into the room, shoot Fleming andget out. Wardrop suspects Schwartz, and he's afraid of him. If he openedthe door just in time to see Schwartz, we will say, backing out the doorand going down the stairs, or to see the door closing and suspect whohad just gone, we would have the whole situation, as I see it, includingthe two motives of deadly hate and jealousy."

"Suppose the stairs open into the back of the room? He was sittingfacing the window. Do you think Schwartz would go in, walk around thetable and shoot him from in front? Pooh! Fudge!"

"He had a neck," I retorted. "I suppose he might have turned his head tolook around."

We had been walking through the rain. The White Cat, as far off as thepoles socially, was only a half-dozen blocks actually from the bestresidence portion of the city. At the corner of the warehouse, Burtonstopped and looked up at it.

"I always get mad when I look at this building," he said. "My greatgrandfather had a truck garden on this exact spot seventy years ago, andthe old idiot sold out for three hundred dollars and a pair of mules!How do you get in?"

"I was wondering if I had a grudge—I have, for that matter—against themayor, and I wanted to shoot him, how I would go about it. I think Ishould find a point of vantage, like an overlooking window in an emptybuilding like this, and I would wait for a muggy night, also like this,when the windows were up and the lights going. I could pot him with athirty-eight at a dozen yards, with my eyes crossed."

We had stopped near the arched gate where I had stood and waited forHunter, a week before. Suddenly Burton darted away from me and tried thegate. It opened easily, and I heard him splashing through a puddle inthe gloomy yard.

The gate swung to behind me, and I could not see six inches from mynose. Burton caught my elbow and steered me, by touching the fence,toward the building.

"If it isn't locked too tight," he was saying, "we can get in, perhapsthrough a window, and get up-stairs. From there we ought to be able tosee down into the club. What the devil's that?"

It was a rat, I think, and it scrambled away among the loose boards in afrenzy of excitement. Burton struck a match; it burned faintly in thedampness, and in a moment went out, having shown us only the approximatelocation of the heavy, arched double doors. A second match showed us abar and a rusty padlock; there was no entrance to be gained in thatway.

The windows were of the eight-paned variety, and in better repair thanthe ones on the upper floors. By good luck, we found one unlocked andnot entirely closed; it shrieked hideously as we pried it up, but anopportune clap of thunder covered the sound.

By this time I was ready for anything that came; I was wet to my knees,muddy, disreputable. While Burton held the window I crawled into thewarehouse, and turned to perform the same service for him. At first Icould not see him, outside. Then I heard his voice, a whisper, frombeyond the sill.

I dropped below the window, and above the rain I could hear the squashof the watchman's boots in the mud. He flashed a night lamp in at thewindow next to ours, but he was not very near, and the open windowescaped his notice. I felt all the nervous dread of a real malefactor,and when I heard the gate close behind him, and saw Burton put a legover the sill, I was almost as relieved as I would have been hadsomebody's family plate, tied up in a tablecloth, been reposing at myfeet.

Burton had an instinct for getting around in the dark. I lighted anothermatch as soon as he had closed the window, and we made out our generaldirection toward where the stairs ought to be. When the match went out,we felt our way in the dark; I had only one box of wax matches, andBurton had dropped his in a puddle.

We got to the second floor, finally, and without any worse mishap thanBurton banging his arm against a wheel of some sort. Unlike the firstfloor, the second was subdivided into rooms; it took a dozen preciousmatches to find our way to the side of the building overlooking theclub, and another dozen to find the window we wanted. When we were thereat last, Burton leaned his elbows on the sill, and looked down andacross.

"Could anything be better!" he said. "There's our theater, and we've gota proscenium box. That room over there stands out like a spot-light."

He was right. Not more than fifteen feet away, and perhaps a foot lowerthan our window, was the window of the room where Fleming had beenkilled. It was empty, as far as we could see; the table, neat enoughnow, was where it had been before, directly under the light. Any one whosat there would be an illuminated target from our window. Not only that,but an arm could be steadied on the sill, allowing for an almost perfectaim.

The club was evidently full of men, as he had prophesied. Above therattle of the rain came the thump—thump of the piano, and a half-dozenmale voices. The shutters below were closed; we could see nothing.

"I'll bet you a five-dollar bill," he said, "that if I fire off myrevolver here, now, not one of those fellows down there would pay theslightest attention."

"I'll take that bet," I returned. "I'll wager that every time anybodydrops a poker, since Fleming was shot, the entire club turns out toinvestigate."

In reply Burton got out his revolver, and examined it by holding itagainst the light from across the way.

"I'll tell you what I'll do," he said. "Everybody down there knows me;I'll drop in for a bottle of beer, and you fire a shot into the floorhere, or into somebody across, if you happen to see any one you don'tcare for. I suggest that you stay and fire the shot, because if youwent, my friend, and nobody heard it, you would accuse me of shootingfrom the back of the building somewhere."

"Wait for ten minutes," he said. "It will take five for me to get out ofhere, and five more to get into the club-house. Perhaps you'd bettermake it fifteen."

CHAPTER XXII

IN THE ROOM OVER THE WAY

He went away into the darkness, and I sat down on an empty box by thewindow and waited. Had any one asked me, at that minute, how near wewere to the solution of our double mystery, I would have said we hadmade no progress—save by eliminating Wardrop. Not for one instant did Idream that I was within less than half an hour of a revelation thatchanged my whole conception of the crime.

I timed the interval by using one of my precious matches to see my watchwhen he left. I sat there for what seemed ten minutes, listening to therush of the rain and the creaking of a door behind me In the darknesssomewhere, that swung back and forth rustily in the draft from thebroken windows. The gloom was infinitely depressing; away from Burton'senthusiasm, his scheme lacked point; his argument, that the nightduplicated the weather conditions of that other night, a week ago,seemed less worthy of consideration.

Besides, I have a horror of making myself ridiculous, and I had an ideathat it would be hard to explain my position, alone in the warehouse,firing a revolver into the floor, if my own argument was right, and theclub should rouse to a search. I looked again at my watch; only sixminutes.

Every one who has counted the passing of seconds knows how they drag.With my eyes on the room across, and my finger on the trigger, I waitedas best I could. At ten minutes I was conscious there was some one inthe room over the way. And then he came into view from the sidesomewhere, and went to the table. He had his back to me, and I couldonly see that he was a large man, with massive shoulders and dark hair.

It was difficult to make out what he was doing. After a half-minute,however, he stepped to one side, and I saw that he had lighted a candle,and was systematically reading and then burning certain papers, throwingthe charred fragments on the table. With the same glance that told methat, I knew the man. It was Schwartz.

I was so engrossed in watching him that when he turned and came directlyto the window, I stood perfectly still, staring at him. With the lightat his back, I felt certain I had been discovered, but I was wrong. Heshook the newspaper which had held the fragments, out of the window,lighted a cigarette and flung the match out also, and turned back intothe room. As a second thought, he went back and jerked at the cord ofthe window-shade, but it refused to move.

He was not alone, for from the window he turned and addressed some onein the room behind.

"All there were, Mr. Schwartz," he replied. "We were nearly finishedbefore the woman made a bolt." He was fumbling in his pockets. I think Iexpected him to produce an apple and a penknife, but he held out a smallobject on the palm of his hand.

"I would rather have done it alone, Mr. Schwartz," he said. "I foundthis ring in Brigg's pocket this morning. It belongs to the girl."

Schwartz swore, and picking up the ring, held it to the light. Then hemade an angry motion to throw it out of the window, but his Germancupidity got the better of him. He slid it into his vest pocket instead.

"You're damned poor stuff, Davidson," he said, with a snarl. "If shehasn't got them, then Wardrop has. You'll bungle this job and there'llbe hell to pay. Tell McFeely I want to see him."

Davidson left, for I heard the door close. Schwartz took the ring outand held it to the light. I looked at my watch. The time was almost up.

A fresh burst of noise came from below. I leaned out cautiously andlooked down at the lower windows; they were still closed and shuttered.When I raised my eyes again to the level of the room across, I wasamazed to see a second figure in the room—a woman, at that.

Schwartz had not seen her. He stood with his back to her, looking at thering in his hand. The woman had thrown her veil back, but I could seenothing of her face as she stood. She looked small beside Schwartz'stowering height, and she wore black.

She must have said something just then, very quietly, for Schwartzsuddenly lifted his head and wheeled on her. I had a clear view of him,and if ever guilt, rage, and white-lipped fear showed on a man's face,it showed on his. He replied—a half-dozen words, in a low tone, andmade a motion to offer her a chair. But she paid no attention.

I have no idea how long a time they talked. The fresh outburst of noisebelow made it impossible to hear what they said, and there was alwaysthe maddening fact that I could not see her face. I thought of Mrs.Fleming, but this woman seemed younger and more slender. Schwartz wasarguing, I imagined, but she stood immobile, scornful, watching him. Sheseemed to have made a request, and the man's evasions moved her no whit.

It may have been only two or three minutes, but it seemed longer.Schwartz had given up the argument, whatever it was, and by pointing outthe window, I supposed he was telling her he had thrown what she wantedout there. Even then she did not turn toward me; I could not see evenher profile.

What happened next was so unexpected that it remains little more than apicture in my mind. The man threw out his hands as if to show he couldnot or would not accede to her request; he was flushed with rage, andeven at that distance the ugly scar on his forehead stood out like awelt. The next moment I saw the woman raise her right hand, withsomething in it.

I yelled to Schwartz to warn him, but he had already seen the revolver.As he struck her hand aside, the explosion came; I saw her stagger,clutch at a chair, and fall backward beyond my range of vision.

I turned and ran frantically toward the stairs. Luckily, I found themeasily. I fell rather than ran down to the floor below. Then I made awrong turning and lost some time. My last match set me right and I gotinto the yard somehow, and to the street.

It was raining harder than ever, and the thunder was incessant. I ranaround the corner of the street, and found the gate to the White Catwithout trouble. The inner gate was unlocked, as Burton had said hewould leave it, and from the steps of the club I could hear laughter andthe refrain of a popular song. The door opened just as I reached the topstep, and I half-tumbled inside.

Burton was there in the kitchen, with two other men whom I did notrecognize, each one holding a stein of beer. Burton had two, and he heldone out to me as I stood trying to get my breath.

"You win," he said. "Although I'm a hard-working journalist and need themoney, I won't lie. This is Osborne of theStar and McTighe of theEagle, Mr. Knox. They heard the shot in there, and if I hadn't toldthe story, there would have been a panic. What's the matter with you?"

"For God's sake, Burton," I panted, "let's get up-stairs quietly. Ididn't fire any shot. There's a woman dead up there."

With characteristic poise, the three reporters took the situationquietly. We filed through the grill-room as casually as we could; withthe door closed, however, we threw caution aside. I led the way up thestairs to the room where I had found Fleming's body, and where Iexpected to find another.

On the landing at the top of the stairs I came face to face withDavidson, the detective, and behind him Judge McFeely. Davidson wastrying to open the door of the room where Fleming had been shot, with askeleton key. But it was bolted inside. There was only one thing to do:I climbed on the shoulders of one of the men, a tall fellow, whose faceto this day I don't remember, and by careful maneuvering and theassistance of Davidson's long arms, I got through the transom anddropped into the room.

I hardly know what I expected. I was in total darkness. I know that whenI had got the door open at last, when the cheerful light from the hallstreamed in, and I had not felt Schwartz's heavy hand at my throat, Idrew a long breath of relief. Burton found the electric light switchand turned it on. And then—I could hardly believe my senses. The roomwas empty.

"Stung!" he said lightly. "What sort of a story have you and your friendframed up, Burton?"

But I stopped at that minute and picked up a small nickel-platedrevolver from the floor. I held it out, on my palm, and the others eyedit respectfully.

Burton, after all, was the quickest-witted of the lot. He threw open oneof the two doors in the room, revealing a shallow closet, with paperedwalls and a row of hooks. The other door stuck tight. One of the menpointed to the floor; a bit of black cloth had wedged it, from the otherside. Our combined efforts got it open at last, and we crowded in thedoorway, looking down a flight of stairs.

CHAPTER XXIII

A BOX OF CROWN DERBY

We got her into the room and on the couch before I knew her. Her fairhair had fallen loose over her face, and one long, thin hand clutchedstill at the bosom of her gown. It was Ellen Butler!

She was living, but not much more. We gathered around and stood lookingdown at her in helpless pity. A current of cold night air came up thestaircase from an open door below, and set the hanging light to swaying,throwing our shadows in a sort of ghastly dance over her quiet face.

I was too much shocked to be surprised. Burton had picked up her hat,and put it beside her.

"She's got about an hour, I should say," said one of the newspaper men."See if Gray is around, will you, Jim? He's mostly here Saturday night."

"No; it is Henry Butler's widow," I returned, and the three men werereporters again, at once.

Gray was there and came immediately. Whatever surprise he may have feltat seeing a woman there, and dying, he made no comment. He said shemight live six hours, but the end was certain. We got a hospitalambulance, and with the clang of its bell as it turned the corner andhurried away, the White Cat drops out of this story, so far as action isconcerned.

Three detectives and as many reporters hunted Schwartz all of that nightand the next day, to get his story. But he remained in hiding. He had astart of over an hour, from the time he switched off the light andescaped down the built-in staircase. Even in her agony, Ellen Butler'shate had carried her through the doorway after him, to collapse on thestairs.

I got home just as the cab, with Fred and Edith, stopped at the door. Idid not let them get out; a half dozen words, without comment orexplanation, and they were driving madly to the hospital.

Katie let me in, and I gave her some money to stay up and watch theplace while we were away. Then, not finding a cab, I took a car and rodeto the hospital.

The building was appallingly quiet. The elevator cage, without a light,crept spectrally up and down; my footsteps on the tiled floor echoed andreëchoed above my head. A night watchman, in felt shoes, admitted me,and took me up-stairs.

There was another long wait while the surgeon finished his examination,and a nurse with a basin of water and some towels came out of the room,and another one with dressings went in. And then the surgeon came out,in a white coat with the sleeves rolled above his elbows, and said Imight go in.

The cover was drawn up to the injured woman's chin, where it was foldedneatly back. Her face was bloodless, and her fair hair had been gatheredup in a shaggy knot. She was breathing slowly, but regularly, and herexpression was relaxed—more restful than I had ever seen it. As I stoodat the foot of the bed and looked down at her, I knew that as surely asdeath was coming, it would be welcome.

Edith had been calm, before, but when she saw me she lost herself-control. She put her head on my shoulder, and sobbed out the shockand the horror of the thing. As for Fred, his imaginative temperamentmade him particularly sensitive to suffering in others. As he sat therebeside the bed I knew by his face that he was repeating and repentingevery unkind word he had said about Ellen Butler.

She was conscious; we realized that after a time. Once she asked forwater, without opening her eyes, and Fred slipped a bit of ice betweenher white lips. Later in the night she looked up for an instant, at me.

During the long night hours I told the story, as I knew it, in anundertone, and there was a new kindliness in Fred's face as he looked ather.

She was still living by morning, and was rallying a little from theshock. I got Fred to take Edith home, and I took her place by the bed.Some one brought me coffee about eight, and at nine o'clock I was askedto leave the room, while four surgeons held a consultation there. Thedecision to operate was made shortly after.

"There is only a chance," a gray-haired surgeon told me in brisk,short-clipped words. "The bullet went down, and has penetrated theabdomen. Sometimes, taken early enough, we can repair the damage, to acertain extent, and nature does the rest. The family is willing, Isuppose?"

I knew of no family but Edith, and over the telephone she said, withsomething of her natural tone, to do what the surgeons considered best.

I hoped to get some sort of statement before the injured woman was takento the operating-room, but she lay in a stupor, and I had to give up theidea. It was two days before I got her deposition, and in that time Ihad learned many things.

On Monday I took Margery to Bellwood. She had received the news aboutMrs. Butler more calmly than I had expected.

"I do not think she was quite sane, poor woman," she said with ashudder. "She had had a great deal of trouble. But how strange—a murderand an attempt at murder—at that little club in a week!"

She did not connect the two, and I let the thing rest at that. Once, onthe train, she turned to me suddenly, after she had been plunged inthought for several minutes.

"Don't you think," she asked, "that she had a sort of homicidal mania,and that she tried to kill me with chloroform?"

"I hardly think so," I returned evasively. "I am inclined to think someone actually got in over the porch roof."

"I am afraid," she said, pressing her gloved hands tight together."Wherever I go, something happens that I can not understand. I neverwilfully hurt any one, and yet—these terrible things follow me. I amafraid—to go back to Bellwood, with Aunt Jane still gone, and you—inthe city."

"A lot of help I have been to you," I retorted bitterly. "Can you thinkof a single instance where I have been able to save you trouble oranxiety? Why, I allowed you to be chloroformed within an inch ofeternity, before I found you."

"But you did find me," she cheered me. "And just to know that you aredoing all you can—"

"It is very comforting to have a friend one can rely on," she finished,and the little bit of kindness went to my head. If she had not got acinder in her eye at that psychological moment, I'm afraid I wouldfiguratively have trampled Wardrop underfoot, right there. As it was, Igot the cinder, after a great deal of looking into one beautifuleye—which is not as satisfactory by half as looking into two—and thenwe were at Bellwood.

We found Miss Letitia in the lower hall, and Heppie on her knees with ahatchet. Between them sat a packing box, and they were having a spiriteddiscussion as to how it should be opened.

"Here, give it to me," Miss Letitia demanded, as we stopped in thedoorway. "You've got stove lengths there for two days if you don't chop'em up into splinters."

With the hatchet poised in mid air she saw us, but she let it descendwith considerable accuracy nevertheless, and our greeting was madebetween thumps.

"Come in"—thump—"like as not it's a mistake"—bang—"but theexpressage was prepaid. If it's mineral water—" crash. Something brokeinside.

"If it's mineral water," I said, "you'd better let me open it. Mineralwater is meant for internal use, and not for hall carpets." I got thehatchet from her gradually. "I knew a case once where a bottle of hairtonic was spilled on a rag carpet, and in a year they had it dyed withspots over it and called it a tiger skin."

She watched me suspiciously while I straightened the nails she had bent,and lifted the boards. In the matter of curiosity, Miss Letitia wastruly feminine; great handfuls of excelsior she dragged out herself, andheaped on Heppie's blue apron, stretched out on the floor.

The article that had smashed under the vigor of Miss Letitia's seventyyears lay on the top. It had been a tea-pot, of some very beautifulware. I have called just now from my study, to ask what sort of ware itwas, and the lady who sets me right says it was Crown Derby. Then therewere rows of cups and saucers, and heterogeneous articles in the samematerial that the women folk seemed to understand. At the last, when theexcitement seemed over, they found a toast rack in a lower corner of thebox and the "Ohs" and "Ahs" had to be done all over again.

Not until Miss Letitia had arranged it all on the dining-room table, andMargery had taken off her wraps and admired from all four corners, didMiss Letitia begin to ask where they had come from. And by that timeHeppie had the crate in the wood-box, and the excelsior was a black andsmoking mass at the kitchen end of the grounds.

There was not the slightest clue to the sender, but while Miss Letitiarated Heppie loudly in the kitchen, and Bella swept up the hall, Margeryvoiced the same idea that had occurred to me.

"If—if Aunt Jane were—all right," she said tremulously, "it would bejust the sort of thing she loves to do."

I had intended to go back to the city at once, but Miss Letitia's boxhad put her in an almost cheerful humor, and she insisted that I go withher to Miss Jane's room, and see how it was prepared for its owner'sreturn.

"I'm not pretending to know what took Jane Maitland away from this housein the middle of the night," she said. "She was a good bit of a fool,Jane was; she never grew up. But if I know Jane Maitland, she will comeback and be buried with her people, if it's only to put Mary's husbandout of the end of the lot.

"And another thing, Knox," she went on, and I saw her old hands wereshaking. "I told you the last time you were here that I hadn't beenrobbed of any of the pearls, after all. Half of those pearls were Jane'sand—she had a perfect right to take forty-nine of them if she wanted.She—she told me she was going to take some, and it—slipped my mind."

I believe it was the first lie she had ever told in her hard,conscientious old life. Was she right? I wondered. Had Miss Jane takenthe pearls, and if she had, why?

Wardrop had been taking a long walk; he got back about five, and as MissLetitia was in the middle of a diatribe against white undergarments forcolored children, Margery and he had a half-hour alone together. I hadknown, of course, that it must come, but under the circumstances, withmy whole future existence at stake, I was vague as to whether it wascolored undergarments on white orphans or the other way round.

When I got away at last, I found Bella waiting for me in the hall. Hereyes were red with crying, and she had a crumpled newspaper in her hand.She broke down when she tried to speak, but I got the newspaper fromher, and she pointed with one work-hardened finger to a column on thefirst page. It was the announcement of Mrs. Butler's tragic accident,and the mystery that surrounded it. There was no mention of Schwartz.

Amid fresh tears and shakings of her heavy shoulders, as she sat in herfavorite place, on the stairs, Bella told me, briefly, that she hadlived with Mrs. Butler since she was sixteen, and had only left when thehusband's suicide had broken up the home. I could get nothing else outof her, but gradually Bella's share in the mystery was coming to light.

Slowly, too—it was a new business for me—I was forming a theory of myown. It was a strange one, but it seemed to fit the facts as I knewthem. With the story Wardrop told that afternoon came my first glimmerof light.

He was looking better than he had when I saw him before, but the news ofMrs. Butler's approaching death and the manner of her injury affectedhim strangely. He had seen the paper, like Bella, and he turned on mealmost fiercely when I entered the library. Margery was in her oldposition at the window, looking out, and I knew the despondent droop ofher shoulders.

He looked relieved at that, but only for a moment. Then he began to pacethe room nervously, evidently debating some move. His next action showedthe development of a resolution, for he pushed forward two chairs forMargery and myself.

"Sit down, both of you," he directed. "I've got a lot to say, and I wantyou both to listen. When Margery has heard the whole story, she willprobably despise me for the rest of her life. I can't help it. I've gotto tell all I know, and it isn't so much after all. You didn't fool meyesterday, Knox; I knew what that doctor was after. But he couldn't makeme tell who killed Mr. Fleming, because, before God, I didn't know."

CHAPTER XXIV

WARDROP'S STORY

"I have to go back to the night Miss Jane disappeared—and that'sanother thing that has driven me desperate. Will you tell me why Ishould be suspected of having a hand in that, when she had been a motherto me? If she is dead, she can't exonerate me; if she is living, and wefind her, she will tell you what I tell you—that I know nothing of thewhole terrible business."

"I am quite certain of that, Wardrop," I interposed. "Besides, I think Ihave got to the bottom of that mystery."

Margery looked at me quickly, but I shook my head. It was too early totell my suspicions.

"The things that looked black against me were bad enough, but they hadnothing to do with Miss Jane. I will have to go back to before the nightshe—went away, back to the time Mr. Butler was the state treasurer,and your father, Margery, was his cashier.

"Butler was not a business man. He let too much responsibility lie withhis subordinates—and then, according to the story, he couldn't do muchanyhow, against Schwartz. The cashier was entirely under machinecontrol, and Butler was neglectful. You remember, Knox, the crash, whenthree banks, rotten to the core, went under, and it was found a largeamount of state money had gone too. It was Fleming who did it—I amsorry, Margery, but this is no time to mince words. It was Fleming whodeposited the money in the wrecked banks, knowing what would happen.When the crash came, Butler's sureties, to save themselves, confiscatedevery dollar he had in the world. Butler went to the penitentiary forsix months, on some minor count, and when he got out, after writing toFleming and Schwartz, protesting his innocence, and asking for enoughout of the fortune they had robbed him of to support his wife, he killedhimself, at the White Cat."

Margery was very pale, but quiet. She sat with her fingers locked inher lap, and her eyes on Wardrop.

"It was a bad business," Wardrop went on wearily. "Fleming moved intoButler's place as treasurer, and took Lightfoot as his cashier. Thatkept the lid on. Once or twice, when there was an unexpected call forfunds, the treasury was almost empty, and Schwartz carried things overhimself. I went to Plattsburg as Mr. Fleming's private secretary when hebecame treasurer, and from the first I knew things were even worse thanthe average state government.

"Schwartz and Fleming had to hold together; they hated each other, andthe feeling was trebled when Fleming married Schwartz's divorced wife."

Margery looked at me with startled, incredulous eyes. What she must haveseen confirmed Wardrop's words, and she leaned back in her chair, limpand unnerved. But she heard and comprehended every word Wardrop wassaying.

"The woman was a very ordinary person, but it seems Schwartz cared forher, and he tried to stab Mr. Fleming shortly after the marriage. Abouta year ago Mr. Fleming said another attempt had been made on his life,with poison; he was very much alarmed, and I noticed a change in himfrom that time on. Things were not going well at the treasury; Schwartzand his crowd were making demands that were hard to supply, and behindall that, Fleming was afraid to go out alone at night.

"He employed a man to protect him, a man named Carter, who had been abartender in Plattsburg. When things began to happen here in Manchester,he took Carter to the home as a butler.

"Then the Borough Bank got shaky. If it went down there would be an uglyscandal, and Fleming would go too. His notes for half a million werethere, without security, and he dared not show the canceled notes hehad, with Schwartz's indorsement.

"I'm not proud of the rest of the story, Margery." He stopped hisnervous pacing and stood looking down at her. "I was engaged to marry agirl who was everything on earth to me, and—I was private secretary tothe state treasurer, with the princely salary of such a position!

"Mr. Fleming came back here when the Borough Bank threatened failure,and tried to get money enough to tide over the trouble. A half millionwould have done it, but he couldn't get it. He was in Butler's positionexactly, only he was guilty and Butler was innocent. He raised a littlemoney here, and I went to Plattsburg with securities and letters. Itisn't necessary to go over the things I suffered there; I brought backone hundred and ten thousand dollars, in a package in my Russia leatherbag. And—I had something else."

He wavered for the first time in his recital. He went on more rapidly,and without looking at either of us.

"I carried, not in the valise, a bundle of letters, five in all, whichhad been written by Henry Butler to Mr. Fleming, letters that showedwhat a dupe Butler had been, that he had been negligent, but notcriminal; accusing Fleming of having ruined him, and demanding certainnotes that would have proved it. If Butler could have produced theletters at the time of his trial, things would have been different."

"I intended to, but—I didn't. It was a little bit too dirty, after all.I met Mrs. Butler for the second time in my life, at the gate downthere, as I came up from the train the night I got here from Plattsburg.She had offered to buy the letters, and I had brought them to sell toher. And then, at the last minute, I lied. I said I couldn't getthem—that they were locked in the Monmouth Avenue house. I put her in ataxicab that she had waiting, and she went back to town. I felt like acad; she wanted to clear her husband's memory, and I—well, Mr. Flemingwas your father, Margery, I couldn't hurt you like that."

"I do not think so. It seems to be the only explanation, but I did notlet it out of my hand one moment while we were talking. My hand wascramped from holding it, when she gave up in despair at last, and wentback to the city."

"I kept them with me that night, and the next morning hid them in thesecret closet. That was when I dropped my fountain pen!"

"Two days before I left," he said. "We were using every method to getmoney, and your father said to sacrifice them, if necessary."

"Did you think I stole them?" he demanded. And I confess that I wasashamed to say I had thought precisely that.

"Your father gave me nine unmounted pearls to sell," he reiterated. "Igot about a thousand dollars for them—eleven hundred and something, Ibelieve."

Margery looked at me. I think she was fairly stunned. To learn that herfather had married again, that he had been the keystone in an arch ofvillainy that, with him gone, was now about to fall, and to associatehim with so small and mean a thing as the theft of a handful ofpearls—she was fairly stunned.

"Then," I said, to bring Wardrop back to his story, "you found you hadbeen robbed of the money, and you went in to tell Mr. Fleming. You hadsome words, didn't you?"

"He thought what you all thought," Wardrop said bitterly. "He accused meof stealing the money. I felt worse than a thief. He was desperate, andI took his revolver from him."

Margery had put her hands over her eyes. It was a terrible strain forher, but when I suggested that she wait for the rest of the story sherefused vehemently.

"I came back here to Bellwood, and the first thing I learned was aboutMiss Jane. When I saw the blood print on the stair rail, I thought shewas murdered, and I had more than I could stand. I took the letters outof the secret closet, before I could show it to you and Hunter, andlater I put them in the leather bag I gave you, and locked it. You haveit, haven't you, Knox?"

"As for that night at the club, I told the truth then, but not all thetruth. I suppose I am a coward, but I was afraid to. If you knewSchwartz, you would understand."

With the memory of his huge figure and the heavy under-shot face that Ihad seen the night before, I could understand very well, knowingWardrop.

"I went to that room at the White Cat that night, because I was afraidnot to go. Fleming might kill himself or some one else. I went up thestairs, slowly, and I heard no shot. At the door I hesitated, thenopened it quietly. The door into the built-in staircase was justclosing. It must have taken me only an instant to realize what hadhappened. Fleming was swaying forward as I caught him. I jumped to thestaircase and looked down, but I was too late. The door below hadclosed. I knew in another minute who had been there, and escaped. It wasraining, you remember, and Schwartz had forgotten to take his umbrellawith his name on the handle!"

"Now do you understand why I was being followed?" he demanded. "I havebeen under surveillance every minute since that night. There's probablysome one hanging around the gate now. Anyhow, I was frantic. I saw howit looked for me, and if I had brought Schwartz into it, I would havebeen knifed in forty-eight hours. I hardly remember what I did. I know Iran for a doctor, and I took the umbrella with me and left it in thevestibule of the first house I saw with a doctor's sign. I rang the belllike a crazy man, and then Hunter came along and said to go back; DoctorGray was at the club.

"That is all I know. I'm not proud of it, Margery, but it might havebeen worse, and it's the truth. It clears up something, but not all. Itdoesn't tell where Aunt Jane is, or who has the hundred thousand. But itdoes show who killed your father. And if you know what is good for you,Knox, you will let it go at that. You can't fight the police and thecourts single-handed. Look how the whole thing was dropped, and themost cold-blooded kind of murder turned into suicide. Suicide without aweapon! Bah!"

"I am not so sure about Schwartz," I said thoughtfully. "We haven't yetlearned about eleven twenty-two C."

CHAPTER XXV

MEASURE FOR MEASURE

Miss Jane Maitland had been missing for ten days. In that time not oneword had come from her. The reporter from theEagle had located her ina dozen places, and was growing thin and haggard following little oldladies along the street—and being sent about his business tartly whenhe tried to make inquiries.

Some things puzzled me more than ever in the light of Wardrop's story.For the third time I asked myself why Miss Letitia denied the loss ofthe pearls. There was nothing in what we had learned, either, to tellwhy Miss Jane had gone away—to ascribe a motive.

How she had gone, in view of Wardrop's story of the cab, was clear. Shehad gone by street-car, walking the three miles to Wynton alone at twoo'clock in the morning, although she had never stirred around the houseat night without a candle, and was privately known to sleep with alight when Miss Letitia went to bed first, and could not see it throughthe transom.

The theory I had formed seemed absurd at first, but as I thought itover, its probabilities grew on me. I took dinner at Bellwood andstarted for town almost immediately after.

Margery had gone to Miss Letitia's room, and Wardrop was pacing up anddown the veranda, smoking. He looked dejected and anxious, and hewelcomed my suggestion that he walk down to the station with me. As wewent, a man emerged from the trees across and came slowly after us.

"You see, I am only nominally a free agent," he said morosely. "They'llpoison me yet; I know too much."

We said little on the way to the train. Just before it came thunderingalong, however, he spoke again.

"I am going away, Knox. There isn't anything in this political game forme, and the law is too long. I have a chum in Mexico, and he wants me togo down there."

"I mean that there isn't any longer a reason why one part of the earthis better than another. Mexico or Alaska, it's all the same to me."

He turned on his heel and left me. I watched him swing up the path, withhis head down; I saw the shadowy figure of the other man fall into linebehind him. Then I caught the platform of the last car as it passed, andthat short ride into town was a triumphal procession with the wheelsbeating time and singing: "It's all the same—the same—to me—to me."

I called Burton by telephone, and was lucky enough to find him at theoffice. He said he had just got in, and, as usual, he wanted somethingto eat. We arranged to meet at a little Chinese restaurant, where atthat hour, nine o'clock, we would be almost alone. Later on, after thetheater, I knew that the place would be full of people, andconversation impossible.

"Hello, Mike," he said to the unctuous Chinaman who admitted us. And"Mike" smiled a slant-eyed welcome. The room was empty; it was anunpretentious affair, with lace curtains at the windows and small, veryclean tables. At one corner a cable and slide communicated through ahole in the ceiling with the floor above, and through the aperture,Burton's order for chicken and rice, and the inevitable tea, was barked.

"So Schwartz did it, after all!" he said regretfully, when I finished."It's a tame ending. It had all the elements of the unusual, and itresolves itself into an ordinary, every-day, man-to-man feud. I'mdisappointed; we can't touch Schwartz."

"Schwartz bought theTimes-Post at three o'clock this afternoon,"Burton said, with repressed rage. "I'm called off. To-morrow we run aphotograph of Schwartzwold, his place at Plattsburg, and the next day weeulogize the administration. I'm going down the river on an excursionboat, and write up the pig-killing contest at the union butchers'picnic."

"How is Mrs. Butler?" I asked, as his rage subsided to mere rumbling inhis throat.

"Delirious"—shortly. "She's going to croak, Wardrop's going to Mexico,Schwartz will be next governor, and Miss Maitland's body will be foundin a cistern. The whole thing has petered out. What's the use of findingthe murderer if he's coated with asbestos and lined with money? Mike, Iwant some more tea to drown my troubles."

We called up the hospital about ten-thirty, and learned that Mrs. Butlerwas sinking. Fred was there, and without much hope of getting anything,we went over. I took Burton in as a nephew of the dying woman, and I wasglad I had done it. She was quite conscious, but very weak. She told thestory to Fred and myself, and in a corner Burton took it down inshorthand. We got her to sign it about daylight sometime, and she diedvery quietly shortly after Edith arrived at eight.

To give her story as she gave it would be impossible; the ramblings of asick mind, the terrible pathos of it all, is impossible to repeat. Shelay there, her long, thin body practically dead, fighting the deathrattle in her throat. There were pauses when for five minutes she wouldlie in a stupor, only to rouse and go forward from the very word whereshe had stopped.

She began with her married life, and to understand the beauty of it isto understand the things that came after. She was perfectly, ideally,illogically happy. Then one day Henry Butler accepted the nomination forstate treasurer, and with that things changed. During his term in officehe altered greatly; his wife could only guess that things were wrong,for he refused to talk.

The crash came, after all, with terrible suddenness. There had been anall-night conference at the Butler home, and Mr. Butler, in a frenzy atfinding himself a dupe, had called the butler from bed and forciblyejected Fleming and Schwartz from the house. Ellen Butler had beenhorrified, sickened by what she regarded as the vulgarity of theoccurrence. But her loyalty to her husband never wavered.

Butler was one honest man against a complete organization ofunscrupulous ones. His disgrace, imprisonment and suicide at the WhiteCat had followed in rapid succession. With his death, all that was worthwhile in his wife died. Her health was destroyed; she became one of thewretched army of neurasthenics, with only one idea: to retaliate, to payback in measure full and running over, her wrecked life, her deadhusband, her grief and her shame.

She laid her plans with the caution and absolute recklessness of adiseased mentality. Normally a shrinking, nervous woman, she becamecold, passionless, deliberate in her revenge. To disgrace Schwartz andFleming was her original intention. But she could not get the papers.

She resorted to hounding Fleming, meaning to drive him to suicide. Andshe chose a method that had more nearly driven him to madness. Whereverhe turned he found the figures eleven twenty-two C. Sometimes just thenumber, without the letter. It had been Henry Butler's cell numberduring his imprisonment, and if they were graven on his wife's soul,they burned themselves in lines of fire on Fleming's brain. For over ayear she pursued this course—sometimes through the mail, at other timesin the most unexpected places, wherever she could bribe a messenger tocarry the paper. Sane? No, hardly sane, but inevitable as fate.

The time came when other things went badly with Fleming, as I hadalready heard from Wardrop. He fled to the White Cat, and for a weekEllen Butler hunted him vainly. She had decided to kill him, and on thenight Margery Fleming had found the paper on the pillow, she had been inthe house. She was not the only intruder in the house that night. Someone—presumably Fleming himself—had been there before her. She found aladies' desk broken open and a small drawer empty. Evidently Fleming,unable to draw a check while in hiding, had needed ready money. As tothe jewels that had been disturbed in Margery's boudoir I could onlysurmise the impulse that, after prompting him to take them, had failedat the sight of his dead wife's jewels. Surprised by the girl'sappearance, she had crept to the upper floor and concealed herself in anempty bedroom. It had been almost dawn before she got out. No doubt thiswas the room belonging to the butler, Carter, which Margery had reportedas locked that night.

She took a key from the door of a side entrance, and locked the doorbehind her when she left. Within a couple of nights she had learned thatWardrop was coming home from Plattsburg, and she met him at Bellwood. Wealready knew the nature of that meeting. She drove back to town, halfmaddened by her failure to secure the letters that would have clearedher husband's memory, but the wiser by one thing: Wardrop hadinadvertently told her where Fleming was hiding.

The next night she went to the White Cat and tried to get in. She knewfrom her husband of the secret staircase, for many a political meetingof the deepest significance had been possible by its use. But the doorwas locked, and she had no key.

Above her the warehouse raised its empty height, and it was not longbefore she decided to see what she could learn from its upper windows.She went in at the gate and felt her way, through the rain, to thewindows. At that moment the gate opened suddenly, and a man mutteredsomething in the darkness. The shock was terrible.

I had no idea, that night, of what my innocent stumbling into thewarehouse yard had meant to a half-crazed woman just beyond my range ofvision. After a little she got her courage again, and she pried up anunlocked window.

The rest of her progress must have been much as ours had been, a fewnights later. She found a window that commanded the club, and with threepossibilities that she would lose, and would see the wrong room, she wonthe fourth. The room lay directly before her, distinct in every outline,with Fleming seated at the table, facing her and sorting some papers.

She rested her revolver on the sill and took absolutely deliberate aim.Her hands were cold, and she even rubbed them together, to make themsteady. Then she fired, and a crash of thunder at the very instantcovered the sound.

Fleming sat for a moment before he swayed forward. On that instant sherealized that there was some one else in the room—a man who took anuncertain step or two forward into view, threw up his hands anddisappeared as silently as he had come. It was Schwartz. Then she sawthe door into the hall open, saw Wardrop come slowly in and close it,watched his sickening realization of what had occurred; then a suddenpanic seized her. Arms seemed to stretch out from the darkness behindher, to draw her into it. She tried to get away, to run, even toscream—then she fainted. It was gray dawn when she recovered her sensesand got back to the hotel room she had taken under an assumed name.

By night she was quieter. She read the news of Fleming's death in thepapers, and she gloated over it. But there was more to be done; she wasonly beginning. She meant to ruin Schwartz, to kill his credit, to fellhim with the club of public disfavor. Wardrop had told her that herhusband's letters were with other papers at the Monmouth Avenue house,where he could not get them.

Fleming's body was taken home that day, Saturday, but she had gone toofar to stop. She wanted the papers before Lightfoot could get at themand destroy the incriminating ones. That night she got into the Fleminghouse, using the key she had taken. She ransacked the library, finding,not the letters that Wardrop had said were there, but others, equally ormore incriminating, canceled notes, private accounts, that would haveruined Schwartz for ever.

It was then that I saw the light and went down-stairs. My unluckystumble gave her warning enough to turn out the light. For the rest, thechase through the back hall, the dining-room and the pantry, hadculminated in her escape up the back stairs, while I had fallen down thedumb-waiter shaft. She had run into Bella on the upper floor, Bella, whohad almost fainted, and who knew her and kept her until morning, pettingher and soothing her, and finally getting her into a troubled sleep.

That day she realized that she was being followed. When Edith'sinvitation came she accepted it at once, for the sake of losing herselfand her papers, until she was ready to use them. It had disconcerted herto find Margery there, but she managed to get along. For several dayseverything had gone well: she was getting stronger again, ready for thesecond act of the play, prepared to blackmail Schwartz, and then exposehim. She would have killed him later, probably; she wanted her measurefull and running over, and so she would disgrace him first.

Then—Schwartz must have learned of the loss of the papers from theFleming house, and guessed the rest. She felt sure he had known from thefirst who had killed Fleming. However that might be, he had had her roomentered, Margery chloroformed in the connecting room, and her paperswere taken from under her pillow while she was pretending anesthesia.She had followed the two men through the house and out the kitchen door,where she had fainted on the grass.

The next night, when she had retired early, leaving Margery and medown-stairs, it had been an excuse to slip out of the house. How shefound that Schwartz was at the White Cat, how she got through the sideentrance, we never knew. He had burned the papers before she got there,and when she tried to kill him, he had struck her hand aside.

When we were out in the cheerful light of day again, Burton turned hisshrewd, blue eyes on me.

"Awful story, isn't it?" he said. "Those are primitive emotions, if youlike. Do you know, Knox, there is only one explanation we haven't workedon for the rest of this mystery—I believe in my soul you carried offthe old lady and the Russia leather bag yourself!"

CHAPTER XXVI

LOVERS AND A LETTER

"Come up," I said, "and bring the keys to the Monmouth Avenue house. Ihave some things to tell you, and—some things to ask you."

I met her at the station with Lady Gray and the trap. My plans for thatafternoon were comprehensive; they included what I hoped to be thesolution of the Aunt Jane mystery; also, they included a little drivethrough the park, and a—well, I shall tell about that, all I am goingto tell, at the proper time.

To play propriety, Edith met us at the house. It was still closed, andeven in the short time that had elapsed it smelled close and musty.

"Now, this is going to be a sort of game," I explained. "It's a sort ofbutton, button, who's got the button, without the button. We arelooking for a drawer, receptacle or closet, which shall contain, bunchedtogether, and without regard to whether they should be there or not, asmall revolver, two military brushes and a clothes brush, two or threesoft bosomed shirts, perhaps a half-dozen collars, and a suit ofunderwear. Also a small flat package about eight inches long and threewide."

"I am not talking, I am theorizing," I explained. "I have a theory, andaccording to it the things should be here. If they are not, it is mymisfortune, not my fault."

I think Margery caught my idea at once, and as Edith was ready foranything, we commenced the search. Edith took the top floor, beingaccustomed, she said, to finding unexpected things in the servants'quarters; Margery took the lower floor, and for certain reasons I tookthe second.

For ten minutes there was no result. At the end of that time I hadfinished two rooms, and commenced on the blue boudoir. And here, on thetop shelf of a three-cornered Empire cupboard, with glass doors andspindle legs, I found what I was looking for. Every article was there. Istuffed a small package into my pocket, and called the two girls.

"When did you lose anything?" Edith demanded. "Do you mean to say, JackKnox, that you brought us here to help you find a suit of gaudy pajamasand a pair of military brushes?"

"I brought you here to find Aunt Jane," I said soberly, taking a letterand the flat package out of my pocket. "You see, my theory worked out.Here is Aunt Jane, andthere is the money from the Russia leatherbag."

I laid the packet in Margery's lap, and without ceremony opened theletter. It began:

When Margery stopped reading, there was an amazed silence. Then we allthree burst into relieved, uncontrolled mirth. The dear, little, oldlady with her new independence and her sixty-five-year-old, romantic,starved heart!

Then we opened the packet, which was a sadder business, for it hadrepresented Allan Fleming's last clutch at his waning public credit.

Edith ran to the telephone with the news for Fred, and for the firsttime that day Margery and I were alone. She was standing with one handon the library table; in the other she held Aunt Jane's letter, halftremulous, wholly tender. I put my hand over hers, on the table.

"Margery, I want my answer, dear. I love you—love you; it isn'tpossible to tell you how much. There isn't enough time in all existenceto tell you. You are mine, Margery—mine. You can't get away from that."

She turned, very slowly, and looked at me with her level eyes. "Yours!"she replied softly, and I took her in my arms.

As she came toward the door, Margery squirmed, but I held her tight. Inthe doorway Edith stopped and stared; then she went swiftly back to thetelephone.

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