“Well; first off you wanted a line on the maid. I got that, all right. She was one of those musical-comedy sorts. I spotted her from the beginning, and I guess you did, too. She wasn’t able to get away from her ‘lady’ much, but she was supposed to eat like anybody else, and——” “Tony, if you tell me that you gave up your sleep to go and fix her at lunch, and that——” “I don’t, and I didn’t tell you anything. But, as a matter of fact, I’d have bust if I hadn’t got a chance on this thing, Jim; you know that. Maybe I seem a bit slow sometimes, but, take it from me, I’m there with the goods when the time comes! Anyway, the maid’s story is perfectly straight, and I’m certain she’s telling the truth. It seems that she isn’t supposed to knock at Miss Legaye’s door until half after eleven. She sleeps in a room on top of the house, connected by telephone, and only comes down at special times, or when she’s phoned for. Last night, she didn’t expect Miss Legaye in early, so didn’t come downstairs to her door till about twenty minutes past eleven. It being a first night, she really didn’t imagine Miss Legaye would be in much before midnight. But at eleven twenty Maria—that’s the maid—came and knocked. She saw that the lights were turned up inside the room. “Miss Legaye called out to her: ‘Maria, don’t bother about me to-night; I’m tired, and I’m going to bed right away. Come at about eight to-morrow, please.’ “Maria went up to bed then, and didn’t come down again until eight, the hour she was expected. That was about fifteen minutes before you and I turned up this morning.” “Well?” demanded Barrison, not so much eagerly as savagely, for he was hot on what he thought to be a trail of some sort, even if not a criminal trail. “Well, what else does she say about when she came in to Miss Legaye’s rooms this morning?” “She says that she came to the door and knocked, as was always her rule, before using her key. She had a key, but was not expected by Miss Legaye to use it unless there was no answer. This time she didn’t get any answer, so she opened the door, and went in. “She went in to Miss Legaye’s bedroom, and found her half awake and half asleep. She said she had had a bad night, and had had to take her sleeping medicine. She looked pale. Maria says that the thing that upset her, Maria, most was the sight of Miss Legaye’s fine opera coat on a chair near the window, where the rain had made it all wet. She said she had barely hung it up, and made Miss Legaye comfortable, when we telephoned up.” Barrison thought a moment. “That sounds all right,” he admitted. “Get ahead, Tony, to the rest of your investigation. For, of course, you must have got at some one else!” “Yes,” said Tony, as he munched fried ham; “I got at the night clerk of the Golden Arms.” “The night clerk? But he wasn’t on duty?”