“Accordingly, Nicholson turned up on the Thursday morning. She let herself into the flat, as Miss Dyke had entrusted the latch-key to her, and went on with the work. Mr. Dyke was in bed, and she got him all his meals that day. She thought she was giving him satisfaction, and was very astonished when, at six o’clock, having cleared away his tea, he told her that he would not require her again. He gave her no explanation, asked her for the latch-key, and gave her her full week’s money—seven shillings in full. Nicholson then put on her bonnet, and went away. “Now,” continued the man in the corner, leaning excitedly forward, and marking each sentence he uttered with an exquisitely complicated knot in his bit of string, “an hour later, another neighbour, Mrs. Marsh, who lived on the same floor as the Dykes, on starting to go out, met Alfred Wyatt on the landing. He took off his hat to her, and then knocked at the door of the Dykes’ flat. “When she came home at eight o’clock, she again passed him on the stairs; he was then going out. She stopped to ask him how Mr. Dyke was, and Wyatt replied: ‘Oh, fairly well, but he misses his daughter, you know.’ “Mrs. Marsh, now closely questioned, said that she thought Wyatt was carrying a large parcel under his arm, but she could not distinguish the shape of the parcel as the angle of the stairs, where she met him, was very dark. She stated, though, that he was running down the stairs very fast. “It was on all that evidence that the police felt justified in arresting Alfred Wyatt for the murder of James Arthur Dyke, and Amelia Dyke for connivance in the crime. And now this very morning, those two young people have been brought before the magistrate, and at this moment evidence—circumstantial, mind you, but positively damning—is being heaped upon them by the prosecution. The police did their work quickly. The very evening after the first day of the inquest, the warrant was out for their arrest.” He looked at a huge silver watch which he always carried in his waistcoat pocket. “I don’t want to miss the defence,” he said, “for I know that it will be sensational. But I did not want to hear the police and medical evidence all over again. You’ll excuse me, won’t you? I shall be back here for five o’clock tea. I know you will be glad to hear all about it.” Chapter III When I returned to the A.B.C shop for my tea at five minutes past five, there he sat in his accustomed corner, with a cup of tea before him, another placed opposite to him, presumably for me, and a long piece of string between his bony fingers. “What will you have with your tea?” he asked politely, the moment I was seated. “A roll and butter and the end of the story,” I replied. “Oh, the story has no end,” he said with a chuckle; “at least, not for the public. As for me, why, I never met a more simple ‘mystery.’ Perhaps that is why the police were so completely at sea.” “Well, and what happened?” I queried, with some impatience.