at Sam considered Farnham his rival, with how
little reason she knew better than any one. She could understand how
her beauty might have driven him to violence; but when the story of the
robbery transpired also--as it did in the course of the morning,--she
was greatly perplexed. When she joined in the lamentations of her
parents and said she never could have believed that of Sam Sleeny, she
was thinking of the theft, and not of the furious assault. When they
had all, however, exhausted their limited store of reflections, a thing
took place which increased the horror and the certainty of Mr. and Mrs.
Matchin, and left Maud a prey to a keener doubt and anxiety than ever.
Late in the afternoon a sharp-faced man, with a bright eye and a red
mustache, came to the house and demanded in the name of the law to be
shown Sam's bedroom. He made several notes and picked up some trifling
articles, for which he gave Mr. Matchin receipts. Corning out of the
room, he looked carefully at the door-knob. "Seems all right," he said.
Then turning to Matchin, he said, with professional severity, "What
door did he generally come in by?"

"Sometimes one and sometimes another," said Saul, determined not to
give any more information than he must.

"Well, I'll look at both," the detective said.

The first one stood his scrutiny without effect, but at the second his
eye sparkled and his cheek flushed with pleasure, when he saw the
faint, red-dish-brown streaks which Offitt had left there the night
before. He could not express his exultation; turning to Saul, "There's
where he came in last night, any way."

"He didn't do no such a thing," replied Saul. "That door I locked
myself last night before he came in."

"Oh, you did? So you're sure he came in at the other door, are you. We
will see if he could get in any other way."

Walking around the corner, he saw the ladder where Offitt had left it.

"Hello! that's his window, ain't it?"

Without waiting for an answer the detective ran up the ladder, studying
every inch of its surface as he ran. He came down positively radiant,
and slapped Saul heartily on the shoulder.

"All right, old man. I'll trouble you to keep that ladder and that door
just as they are. They are important papers. Why don't you see?" he
continued--"bless your innocent old heart, he comes home with his hands
just reg'larly dripping with murder. He fumbles at that door, finds it
locked, and so gets that ladder, histes it up