"I was near the door, and though I was not looking out into the hall, I had a vague, fleeting impression of somebody running upstairs. I paid no attention to it, of course, but I am sure somebody did." "A man or a woman?" "A woman. That is, I was conscious of a flutter of skirts, but I am not sure it was Miss Van Allen. I didn't see her clearly enough even to notice the color of her gown. It was merely a glimpse of some one flying round the newel post and up the stairs. It might have been a stranger." "You mean, if there were some intruder, it may have been a woman, and not a man?" "I don't know, I tell you. I can only say I know somebody ran upstairs. Further than that, I've no idea concerning it." "It must have been Miss Van Allen," said the coroner, decidedly; "had it been any other woman, and had she stabbed Mr. Schuyler, Miss Van Allen would not have disappeared. Now, if this woman who ran upstairs was Miss Van Allen, she effected an escape from the upper stories. Is there a skylight exit?" No one seemed to know, as no one had thought of Vicky Van leaving her house by such means. But to me, the idea was ridiculous. A girl, in elaborate evening gown, clambering out of a skylight trap-door, to where? Not to a neighbor's, for Vicky Van knew none of the nearby residents. I had heard her say so, myself. And had she descended into a strange household, and begged for shelter, it would have become known before this. Well, anyway, the detective Lowney immediately sent an order to have the skylight matter looked into and the proceedings went on. Ariadne Gale was closely questioned as to how she knew of the picture in the back of Randolph Schuyler's watch. But she declared that he had shown it to her during their conversation that evening. "I never saw the man before," said Ariadne, who unlike Cassie Weldon, rather enjoyed the publicity of the occasion. "I chanced to be about the first girl he was introduced to, when he came into the house. And we had a chat, and when I chaffed him a bit on his dignity and awe-inspiring presence, he refuted it by showing me the picture in his watch. He said it was a little chorus girl he had taken out to supper the night before. I could see the picture had been merely tucked in temporarily, it wasn't neatly pasted in, as a watch-case picture usually is, and then I chaffed him on his fickleness. Our conversation was the merest foolery, and a moment after, he went over to be presented to Miss Van Allen." "You think they had never met before?" "I'm sure they had not. They looked at each other with the conventional politeness of strangers, I know Miss Van Allen well, and she is not one to dissemble or pretend. I am sure she had never laid eyes on that man before. She simply _couldn't_ have killed him!" Ariadne's further evidence amounted to nothing, nor did that of several other of the party guests who were called on.