And the restless eyes had ceased their wandering at last, stilled by the cold hand of death. Upon the woman's forehead a fearful bruise was plainly to be seen as the detective stooped, and, by the light of the candle which he had seized from the table, examined the inanimate form. It was such a mark as a man's fist might make upon the right temple above the eye. There was nothing save this fearful bruise, which in itself would have been enough to have felled the strongest man, far less a frail woman like this. Caleb Hook set the candle upon the floor, and taking the woman's hand in his own, silently felt her pulse. It had ceased to beat--the hand was already cold. "Is she dead?" demanded the saloon-keeper, in a frightened whisper. "She certainly is," replied the detective. "Can you look at her and ask? That blow must have been the work of a powerful man--coward, I should rather say, whoever he was, to use a woman so." "God save us! an' yer right," exclaimed Slattery, with a shudder. "An' she was a dacent body, if she war mad. Bad luck to the murtherin' spalpane who raised his hand agin her. I would I had me own two hands about his throat!" As the warm-hearted Irishman uttered these words, with some evidence of deep feeling, the sound of footsteps was heard on the stairs without, and a stout woman, bare-headed and so lightly dressed as to leave a strong suspicion in the minds of the two men who beheld her that she had just left her bed, now bustled into the room. "An' what's all the row up here?" she demanded. "There's noise enough to wake the dead." "But not enough to wake yon poor crayter, Mrs. O'Brien!" exclaimed Slattery, grimly, pointing at the same time toward the body of the woman on the floor. "D'ye know what's been goin' on up here? Poor Mrs. Marley's after bein' murdered." "Holy Vargin! an' is it murther that's been done?" cried the woman, who, having caught sight of the body, now sprang toward the door, extending her hands before her, as if to ward off the sight. "Help! Murder! Perlice! Och, an' it's bad luck that's overtook me respictible house!" Before the hand of the detective could be raised to stay her, the frightened creature had rushed down the stairs, through the alley and out into the street, causing the air to ring with her cries of murder and her shouts for the police. "It's the woman down stairs," said Slattery aghast. "Sure, an' it's the whole worruld we'll have in to join us now." Caleb Hook made no reply. He cared little, in fact, who entered this chamber of death and who stayed away. He could not be everywhere, and had no desire to take charge of the case. The woman was dead, and her knowledge concerning the robbery of the Webster Bank must remain forever untold. Nevertheless, he realized fully that between the robbery and this murder there was unquestionably a connecting link. In all human probability the secrets possessed by this unfortunate creature had cost her life.