“Because of the meeting?” asked Cray. “I don’t know,” Mrs. Peyton said. “He declared afterward he had never seen the girl before—but—oh—I can’t believe she came back here that night!” “Of course she didn’t,” Cray said. “How could she get in, unless someone admitted her.” “There’s the French window in the study,” Mrs. Peyton suggested, uncertainly. “Doctor Waring could have let her in that way—” “Well, he didn’t!” Miss Bascom declared. “Land! I’ve known John Waring all my life, and he’s not the kind of man that had anything to do with flirtatious young women.” Of a truth, Liza Bascom had known Waring for many years and had spent a number of them in desperate efforts to persuade him to renounce bachelorhood in her favor. Yet her words carried little weight with Attorney Cray, who fancied that he knew men better than the insistent spinster possibly could. “Miss Bascom,” he said, after further thought, “and Mrs. Peyton, too, I’m going to ask you—I’m going to instruct you to keep this matter quiet until after the funeral of Doctor Waring. That occurs tomorrow, and I want a day or so to look into this thing quietly. We would gain nothing by rushing matters. I will see Miss Austin, of course, and rest assured, if she is guilty of any wrong doing, she shall not escape. But it is a serious matter to accuse a suspect without giving any chance for explanation—” “There’s no explanation of that ruby pin and all that money, that is not incriminating to that girl!” Miss Bascom exclaimed. “Nevertheless, I am in authority, and I forbid you to discuss the connection of Miss Austin with the case at all.” Cray knew how to impress belligerent women, and he even added a hint of their making trouble for themselves unless they obeyed his explicit command. He returned to the study, where Gordon Lockwood was going over the morning’s mail. The secretary was a busy man, for his late employer had had a number of diversified interests and every mail brought letters, catalogues, circulars and newspapers that required careful attention. John Waring had been a collector of rare books, and other curios, and was interested in several literary enterprises. To many of these correspondents Lockwood could merely send a statement of the Doctor’s death. But others involved careful and wise judgment, and Lockwood conscientiously discharged his duties. The study had been put in order, and all traces of the tragedy had been removed. The books that had been on the desk, including the blood-stained copy of Martial, Lockwood had, after consideration, restored to their places on the shelves. Although it gave him a thrill of horror, Lockwood had nerved himself to appropriate Waring’s desk, for it meant far greater convenience in his work. He sat there as Cray entered, and raised his impassive face to note the attorney’s excitement.