“That’s just it, he did. He’d storm and rail at Daisy,—she’s on his elevator, and then he’d turn around and chuck her under the chin, and like as not bring her home a big box of chocolates.” “Oh, well, I’ve heard of men like that before.” “But not so much so. I don’t believe anybody ever went for the girls rough-shod as bad as he did. He called them down for the least thing,—and then, sometimes he’d make it up to them and sometimes he wouldn’t.” “And the chorus ladies? But I suppose you don’t know much about them.” “Don’t I? Well, I guess I do! Why, Mr Binney—Sir Binney, I mean,—he used to tell me the tallest yarns I ever heard, about his little suppers,—as he called ’em. He’d come ’long about two G. M. pretty mellow, and in an expansive mood, and he’d pour out his heart to old Bob,—meaning me. Yes, sir, I know a thing or two about Binney’s lady friends, and there’s a few of them that wouldn’t mind knifing him a bit,—if they were sure they wouldn’t be found out. And,—if you ask me, that’s just what happened.” “H’m; you mean they followed him home, and slipped in after him——” “Yep.” “But how did they know they’d find the coast clear,—that you’d so very conveniently be up in the elevator, and would stay up there such an unusually long time? You’d better shut up, Moore. Everything you say gets you deeper in the net. If your chorus girl theory is the right dope, you were in on it, too. Otherwise it couldn’t have been worked!” “All right, Mr Corson, I’ll shut up. You’ll see the time when you’ll be mighty glad to turn to me for help. Till then, work on your own; but you needn’t aim this way, it won’t get you anywhere.” Meantime there was consternation among the nearest of kin to the dead man. In the Prall apartment, Miss Letitia was conducting conversation ably aided and abetted by Eliza Gurney, while young Bates sat listening and joining in when there was opportunity. “Worst of all is the disgrace,” Miss Prall was saying. “There’s no use my pretending I’m over-come with grief,—personal grief, I mean, for I never cared two straws for the man, and I’m not going to make believe I did. But the publicity and newspaper talk is terrible. Once it blows over and is forgotten we’ll be able to hold up our heads again, but just now, we’re in the public eye,—and it’s an awful place to be!” “But who did it, Aunt Letitia,” said Bates. “We’ve got to get the murderer——” “I don’t mind so much about that,” his aunt returned, with a sharp sniff. “All I want is to get the thing hushed up. Of course, you’re the heir now, Ricky, so you must put on suitable mourning and all that, but those things can be attended to in due course.” “Where you going to have the funeral and when?” asked Eliza. “I don’t think I’ll go.”