tercation, blows, a struggle, in the course of which Braden met his
death; the other is that Ransford deliberately took Braden up into the
gallery and flung him through that open doorway--"

"That," observed Mary, with something very like a sneer, "seems so
likely that I should think it would never occur to anybody but the sort
of people you're telling me of! No man of any real sense would believe
it for a minute!"

"Some people of plain common sense do believe it for all that!" retorted
Bryce. "For it's quite possible. But as I say, I'm only repeating. And
of course, the rest of it follows on that. The police theory is that
Collishaw witnessed Braden's death at Ransford's hands, that Ransford
got to know that Collishaw knew of that, and that he therefore quietly
removed Collishaw. And it is on all that that they're going, and will
go. Don't ask me if I think they're right or wrong! I'm only telling you
what I know so as to show you what danger Ransford is in."

Mary made no immediate answer, and Bryce sat watching her. Somehow--he
was at a loss to explain it to himself--things were not going as he had
expected. He had confidently believed that the girl would be frightened,
scared, upset, ready to do anything that he asked or suggested. But she
was plainly not frightened. And the fingers which busied themselves with
the fancy-work had become steady again, and her voice had been steady
all along.

"Pray," she asked suddenly, and with a little satirical inflection of
voice which Brice was quick to notice, "pray, how is it that you--not
a policeman, not a detective!--come to know so much of all this?
Since when were you taken into the confidence of Mitchington and the
mysterious person from London?"

"You know as well as I do that I have been dragged into the case against
my wishes," answered Bryce almost sullenly. "I was fetched to Braden--I
saw him die. It was I who found Collishaw--dead. Of course, I've been
mixed up, whether I would or not, and I've had to see a good deal of the
police, and naturally I've learnt things."

Mary suddenly turned on him with a flash of the eye which might have
warned Bryce that he had signally failed in the main feature of his
adventure.

"And what have you learnt that makes you come here and tell me all
this?" she exclaimed. "Do you think I'm a simpleton, Dr. Bryce? You set
out by saying that Dr. Ransford is in danger from the police, and that
you know more--much more than the pol