The Lady Sleuths MEGAPACK TM(292)

                “The test may not be concluded in two nights,” he proceeded, without any notice of my words. “So do not be in haste to spot your man, as the vulgar expression is. And now good-night—we shall meet again tomorrow.”



                             “Wait!” I called peremptorily, for he was on the point of closing the door. “I saw the man but faintly; it is an impression only that I received. I would not wish a man to hang through any identification I could make.”

                “No man hangs on simple identification. We shall have to prove the crime, madam, but identification is important; even such as you can make.”

                There was no more to be said; I uttered a calm good-night and hastened away. By a judicious use of my opportunities I had become much less ignorant on the all-important topic than when I entered the house.

                It was half past eleven when I returned home, a late hour for me to enter my respectable front door alone. But circumstances had warranted my escapade, and it was with quite an easy conscience and a cheerful sense of accomplishment that I went up to my room and prepared to sit out the half hour before midnight.

                I am a comfortable sort of person when alone, and found no difficulty in passing this time profitably. Being very orderly, as you must have remarked, I have everything at hand for making myself a cup of tea at any time of day or night; so feeling some need of refreshment, I set out the little table I reserve for such purposes and made the tea and sat down to sip it.

                While doing so, I turned over the subject occupying my mind, and endeavored to reconcile the story told by the clock with my preconceived theory of this murder; but no reconcilement was possible. The woman had been killed at twelve, and the clock had fallen at five. How could the two be made to agree, and which, since agreement was impossible, should be made to give way, the theory or the testimony of the clock? Both seemed incontrovertible, and yet one must be false. Which?

                I was inclined to think that the trouble lay with the clock; that I had been deceived in my conclusions, and that it was not running at the time of the crime. Mr. Gryce may have ordered it wound, and then have had it laid on its back to prevent the hands from shifting past the point where they had stood at the time of the crime’s discovery. It was an unexplainable act, but a possible one; while to suppose that it was going when the shelves fell, stretched improbability to the utmost, there having been, so far as we could learn, no one in the house for months sufficiently dexterous to set so valuable a timepiece; for who could imagine the scrub-woman engaging in a task requiring such delicate manipulation.



                             No! some meddlesome official had amused himself by starting up the works, and the clue I had thought so important would probably prove valueless.

                There was humiliation in the thought, and it was a relief to me to hear an approaching carriage just as the clock on my mantel struck twelve. Springing from my chair, I put out my light and flew to the window.

                The coach drew up and stopped next door. I saw a gentleman descend and step briskly across the pavement to the neighboring stoop. The figure he presented was not that of the man I had seen enter the night before.


CHAPTER VIII.

                THE MISSES VAN BURNAM

                Late as it was when I retired, I was up betimes in the morning—as soon, in fact, as the papers were distributed. The Tribune lay on the stoop. Eagerly I seized it; eagerly I read it. From its headlines you may judge what it had to say about this murder:

                A STARTLING DISCOVERY IN THE VAN BURNAM MANSION IN GRAMERCY PARK.



                             A Young Girl Found there, Lying Dead under an Overturned Cabinet.