"I've had a dozen but they don't seem to hold water. I guess it was a gunman, imported direct--though perhaps I'm just hoping it wasn't one of them trollops did it--for the sake of the family as well as poor Dave's name. I don't want a scandal like that. Murder's bad enough, the Lord knows." "What sort of footsteps in the grounds?" "Every kind we've got in Elsinore, I guess. About forty people were runnin' round the yard before the police came. Funny that Gifning didn't think of that. But he says the breath was knocked out of him. Jimminy! I never knew anything to upset the town like this before--the county, you might say. The telephone's been buzzin' till the girls have threatened to strike. An operator fainted this morning--wonder if Dave knew her?" "Well, I am rather surprised to learn that Balfame was so popular--" "'Tain't that only--though Dave still had lots of friends in spite of that ugly temper he was growin'; but we've all got enemies--every last one of us--and to be shot down at his own gate like that--Gee, it has given every man in town the creeps. We must get the man quick and make an example of him. I hope I'm drawn." "I hope he doesn't ask me to defend him. How is Mrs. Balfame bearing up?" "Fine. She's as cool as they make 'em. I'd hate to be married to one of them cucumbers myself, but they're damned convenient in times of trouble. Maybe she cared a lot for Dave; who knows? At any rate we must make people think she did. I don't want suspicion pointing to her." "What! It is incredible that you should think of such a thing." Rush, always pale, had turned as white as chalk. "You can't mean that people are saying--" "Not yet. But we've got to be prepared for anything, especially with these New York newspapermen on the trail. Unless we catch the murderer damned quick, every last one of us that was close to Dave that can't prove an alibi will be suspected. Why, I walked with him for two blocks after he left my house--thought he might not be able to make it alone, and he wouldn't go in the car; then, I didn't go straight home, either. I went to my office to straighten out something--Oh, Lord! don't let's talk of it; I must have been there alone, not a soul to see me, when he was shot. It gives me the horrors to think of it--" "Nonsense! It was well known that you were his best friend. No one would think of you." "They might! They might!" "Well--about Mrs. Balfame?"