"How did he look then, Leah? Where was he sitting?" "He was sitting at his table, sir, and he looked as usual, for all I saw, but his head was bent over something he was reading. I put some coals on the fire and came away. Mr. Charles, who is up there with him?" "Dr. Dickenson and----" A knock at the door interrupted me. It proved to be the other doctor I had sent for. The medical men proceeded to examine Mr. Brightman more closely. I had sent for the police, and they also were present. I then searched his pockets, a policeman aiding me, and we put their contents carefully away. But there was no bag containing gold amongst them. How had it disappeared? A most unhappy circumstance was the fact that I could not send for Mrs. Brightman, for I did not know where she was. Mr. Brightman had said she was out of town, but did not say where. When Watts came home, I despatched him to the house at Clapham, allowing him no time to indulge his grief or his curiosity. Leah had knelt down by Mr. Brightman, tears silently streaming from her eyes. The fire in the front room was relighted; the fire, the very coals, which he, poor man, had so recently taken off; and I, Lennard and Arthur Lake went in there to talk the matter over quietly. "Lennard," I said, "I am not satisfied that he has died a natural death. I hope----" "There are no grounds for any other supposition, Mr. Strange," he interrupted. "None whatever. _Are_ there?" he added, looking at me. "I trust there are none--but I don't quite like the attendant circumstances of the case. The loss of that bag of money causes all sorts of unpleasant suspicions to arise. When you came to the house, Lennard, did you go straight upstairs?" I added, after a pause. "No, I went into the front office," replied Lennard. "I thought Sir Edmund Clavering might still be here." "Was Leah out or in?" "Leah was standing at the front door, looking--as it seemed to me--down the steps leading to the Thames. While I was lighting my candle by the hall-lamp, she shut the front door and came to me. She was extremely agitated, and----" "Agitated?" I interrupted. "Yes," said Lennard; "I could not be mistaken. I stared at her, wondering what could cause it, and why her face was so white--almost as white as Mr. Brightman's is now. She asked--as earnestly as if she were pleading for life--whether I would stop in the house for a few minutes, as Mr. Brightman had not gone, while she ran out upon an errand. I inquired whether Sir Edmund Clavering was upstairs, and she said no; he had left; Mr. Strange was out, and Mr. Brightman was alone." "Did she go out?"