He took another step and two shadows seemed to fall upon him from behind, one on either side. With primitive instinct a cry of terror and surprise escaped him as he made a desperate movement to wrench himself free, and for a short second he almost succeeded in dragging one hand into a pocket. Then his wrists slowly came together and the handcuffs closed. "I am Inspector Beedel," said the man on his right side. "You are charged with the attempted murder of your wife, Millicent Creake." "You are mad," retorted the miserable creature, falling into a desperate calmness. "She has been struck by lightning." "No, you blackguard, she hasn't," wrathfully exclaimed his brother-in-law, jumping up. "Would you like to see her?" "I also have to warn you," continued the inspector impassively, "that anything you say may be used as evidence against you." A startled cry from the farther end of the passage arrested their attention. "Mr Carrados," called Hollyer, "oh, come at once." At the open door of the other bedroom stood the lieutenant, his eyes still turned towards something in the room beyond, a little empty bottle in his hand. "Dead!" he exclaimed tragically, with a sob, "with this beside her. Dead just when she would have been free of the brute." The blind man passed into the room, sniffed the air, and laid a gentle hand on the pulseless heart. "Yes," he replied. "That, Hollyer, does not always appeal to the woman, strange to say." THE CLEVER MRS STRAITHWAITE Mr Carlyle had arrived at The Turrets in the very best possible spirits. Everything about him, from his immaculate white spats to the choice gardenia in his buttonhole, from the brisk decision with which he took the front-door steps to the bustling importance with which he had positively brushed Parkinson aside at the door of the library, proclaimed consequence and the extremely good terms on which he stood with himself. "Prepare yourself, Max," he exclaimed. "If I hinted at a case of exceptional delicacy that will certainly interest you by its romantic possibilities----?" "I should have the liveliest misgivings. Ten to one it would be a jewel mystery," hazarded Carrados, as his friend paused with the point of his communication withheld, after the manner of a quizzical youngster with a promised bon-bon held behind his back. "If you made any more of it I should reluctantly be forced to the conclusion that the case involved a society scandal connected with a priceless pearl necklace." Mr Carlyle's face fell. "Then it _is_ in the papers, after all?" he said, with an air of disappointment. "What is in the papers, Louis?" "Some hint of the fraudulent insurance of the Hon. Mrs Straithwaite's pearl necklace," replied Carlyle. "Possibly," admitted Carrados. "But so far I have not come across it." Mr Carlyle stared at his friend, and marching up to the table brought his hand down on it with an arresting slap.