lmes, don't you think you're going it pretty strong?"
protested Billie Budd, the man from Australia, as he was shoved along
with the rest of them by the masterful detective.

"Just keep your shirt on, Mr. Budd," said the latter, as he locked the
door of the Earl's room behind him and put the key in his pocket. "I'm
running this show, not you. I was sent here to get results, and I'm
going to get 'em,--see?"

"I guess the old cocaine is beginning to work on him again," I
muttered.

Then I started with the gun to the rear door of the castle, while
Holmes, after overawing the others, stationed himself at the front
door, with another loaded and cocked revolver in his hand.

After about fifteen minutes of tiresome waiting, while several of the
servants peeped out at me from the rear rooms as I stood sentinel at
the end of the corridor, just inside the great iron barred door, I
heard Holmes's welcome shout from the front of the building:

"All right, Watson; the constables are here!"

In a moment a wooden-faced gink appeared, who said he had come to
relieve me. I put the revolver in my pocket and rejoined Holmes in the
drawing-room, where I found him with Lord Launcelot and the others.

"Well, boys, I've got four constables completely surrounding the
castle now,--one on each side,--so we'll sit down to breakfast. It's
nearly nine o'clock now."

And Holmes moved toward the dining-room.

"All right, old top," said Launcelot, smiling at the detective. "As
long as George Arthur,--the Earl, you know,--is disabled or dead, I am
the master of the house, and I'll back you up in everything you do."

"Even if I should happen to arrest you for stealing some of the
cuff-buttons yourself, eh?" queried Holmes with a grin, as we sat down
to our delayed breakfast.

Launcelot sort of choked at this, stared at the speaker, and said:

"What queer things you _do_ get off, Mr. Holmes! Your idea of a joke,
I suppose."

CHAPTER IV

The ever-smiling butler we had met the day before, whose spirits did
not seem dampened by the tragedies that had lately occurred, moved
around the table silently and quickly as he waited on us seven men
partaking of breakfast, with a dead man in the other room.

As I watched them there, I noticed that the five habitues of the
castle all seemed rather embarrassed when Holmes looked at them, and
would then look the other way, evidently on account of his brutal
remark to the Earl's brother.

Harr