He paused, quite overcome. Others amongst us were overcome, too, but only for a moment. The following remark from the district attorney soon recalled us to the practical aspects of the case. “You have accounted for many facts not hitherto understood. But there is still a very important one which neither yourself nor Miss Tuttle has yet made plain. There was a candle on the scene of crime; it was out when this officer arrived here. There was also one found burning in the upstairs room, aside from the one you professedly used in your tour of inspection there. Whence came those candles? And did your wife blow out the one in the library herself, previous to the shooting, or was it blown out afterward and by other lips?” “These are questions which, as I have already said, I have no means of answering,” repeated Mr. Jeffrey. “The courage which brought her here may have led her to supply herself with light; and, hard as it is to conceive, she may even have found nerve to blow out the light before she lifted the pistol to her breast:” The district attorney and the major looked unconvinced, and the latter, turning toward Miss Tuttle, asked if she had any remark to make on the subject. But she could only repeat Mr. Jeffrey’s statement. “These are questions _I_ can not answer either. I have said that I stopped at the library door, which means that I saw nothing of what passed within.” Here the major asked where Mrs. Jeffrey’s letter was to be found. It was Mr. Jeffrey who replied: “Search in my room for a book with an outside cover of paper still on it. You will probably find it on my table. The inner cover is red. Bring that book here. Our secret is hidden in it.” Durbin disappeared on this errand. I followed him as far as the door, but I did not think it necessary to state that I had seen this book lying on the table when I paid my second visit to Mr. Jeffrey’s room in company with the coroner. The thought that my hand had been within reach of this man’s secret so many weeks before was sufficiently humiliating without being shared. XXIV. TANTALIZING TACTICS I made my way to the front door, but returned almost immediately. Drawing the major aside, I whispered a request, which led to a certain small article being passed over to me, after which I sauntered out on the stoop just in time to encounter the spruce but irate figure of Mr. Moore, who had crossed from the opposite side. “Ah!” said I. “Good morning!” and made him my most deferential bow. He glared and Rudge glared from his place on the farther curb. Evidently the police were not in favor with the occupants of the cottage that morning.