t once.

"She said, also, that her father was in our car, and that there would be
the mischief to pay in the morning. It was probably when my sister tried
to get the papers that he awakened, and she had to do--what she did."

It was over. Save for a technicality or two, I was a free man. Alison
rose quietly and prepared to go; the men stood to let her pass, save
Sullivan who sat crouched in his chair, his face buried in his hands.
Hotchkiss, who had been tapping the desk with his pencil, looked up
abruptly and pointed the pencil at me.

"If all this is true, and I believe it is,--then who was in the house
next door, Blakeley, the night you and Mr. Johnson searched? You
remember, you said it was a woman's hand at the trap door."

I glanced hastily at Johnson, whose face was impassive. He had his hand
on the knob of the door and he opened it before he spoke.

"There were a number of scratches on Mrs. Conway's right hand," he
observed to the room in general. "Her wrist was bandaged and badly
bruised."

He went out then, but he turned as he closed the door and threw at me a
glance of half-amused, half-contemptuous tolerance.

McKnight saw Alison, with Mrs. Dallas, to their carriage, and came back
again. The gathering in the office was breaking up. Sullivan, looking
worn and old, was standing by the window, staring at the broken necklace
in his hand. When he saw me watching him, he put it on the desk and
picked up his hat.

"If I can not do anything more--" he hesitated.

"I think you have done about enough," I replied grimly, and he went out.

I believe that Richey and Hotchkiss led me somewhere to dinner, and
that, for fear I would be lonely without him, they sent for Johnson.
And I recall a spirited discussion in which Hotchkiss told the detective
that he could manage certain cases, but that he lacked induction. Richey
and I were mainly silent. My thoughts would slip ahead to that hour,
later in the evening, when I should see Alison again.

I dressed in savage haste finally, and was so particular about my tie
that Mrs. Klopton gave up in despair.

"I wish, until your arm is better, that you would buy the kind that
hooks on," she protested, almost tearfully. "I'm sure they look very
nice, Mr. Lawrence. My late husband always--"

"That's a lover's knot you've tied this time," I snarled, and, jerking
open the bow knot she had so painfully executed, looked out the
window for Johnson--until I recalled that he no