The girl did not rise at Bannard's approach, but sat, looking up at him, her face full of inquiry. "Where have you been?" she demanded; "why didn't you come sooner? I telegraphed at four o'clock--I telephoned first, but they said--they said you were out." "I was; I only came in at seven, and then I found your messages, and I caught the first train possible." "It doesn't matter," said Iris, wearily. "There's nothing you can do--nothing anybody can do. Oh, Win, it's horrible!" "Of course it is, Iris. But I'm so in the dark. Tell me all about it." "Oh, I can't. I can't seem to talk about it. Mrs. Bowen will tell you." The little lady told all she knew, and then, one of the detectives appeared to question Bannard. He explained his presence and told who he was and then asked to go into his aunt's sitting room. "Not just now," said the man, whose name was Hughes, "the doctors are busy in there, with the coroner." "Why so late," asked Bannard; "what have they been doing all the afternoon?" "Doctor Littell came at once," explained Mrs. Bowen, "he's her own doctor, you know. But that coroner, Doctor Timken, never got here till this evening. Why, here's Mr. Chapin!" Charles Chapin, who was Mrs. Pell's lawyer, entered, and also Mr. Bowen, so there was quite a group in waiting when the doctors came out of the closed room. "It's the strangest case imaginable," said Coroner Timken, his face white and terrified. "There's not the least possibility of suicide--and yet there's no explanation for a murder." "Why do you say that?" asked Chapin, who had heard little of the details. "The body is terribly injured. There are livid bruises on her chest, shoulders and upper arms. There are marks on her wrists, as if she had been bound by ropes, and similar marks on her ankles." "Incredible!" cried Mr. Chapin. "Bound?" "The marks can mean nothing else. They are as if cords had been tightly drawn, and on one ankle the stocking is slightly stained with blood." "What?" exclaimed Mrs. Bowen. "Yes, and the flesh beneath the stain is abraded round the ankle, and the skin broken. The other ankle shows slight marks of the cord, but it did not cut into the flesh on that side. Her wrists, too, show red marks and indentations, as of cords. It is inexplicable." "But the bruises?" pursued Mr. Chapin, "and the awful wound on her face?"