But no questioning, however adroit, could elicit from him the faintest information as to how it got there. The last time he remembered seeing it, he said, was on Mr. Waring's table the morning of the review. A detective testified to having found it among the bushes under the window as the water receded. Ferry and the miserable Ananias were called, and they, too, had to identify the knife, and admit that neither had seen it about the room since Mr. Waring left for town. Of other witnesses called, came first the proprietor of the stable to which the cab belonged. Horse and cab, he said, covered with mud, were found under a shed two blocks below the French Market, and the only thing in the cab was a handsome silk umbrella, London make, which Lieutenant Pierce laid claim to. Mrs. Doyle swore that as she was going in search of her husband she met the cab just below the Pelican, driving furiously away, and that in the flash of lightning she recognized the driver as the man whom Lieutenant Waring had beaten that morning on the levee in front of her place. A stranger was seated beside him. There were two gentlemen inside, but she saw the face of only one,--Lieutenant Waring. Nobody else could throw any light on the matter. The doctor, recalled, declared the knife or dagger was shaped exactly as would have to be the one that gave the death-blow. Everything pointed to the fact that there had been a struggle, a deadly encounter, and that after the fatal work was done the murderer or murderers had left the doors locked and barred and escaped through the window, leaving the desk rifled and carrying away what money there was, possibly to convey the idea that it was only a vulgar murder and robbery, after all. Of other persons who might throw light upon the tragedy the following were missing: Lieutenant Waring, Private Dawson, the cabman, and the unrecognized stranger. So, too, was Anatole's boat. CHAPTER VIII.