lips, he
gave the detective a long, searching look, to which Hastings paid no
attention.

Webster talked nearly twenty minutes, explaining his eagerness to be
"thoroughly frank as to every detail," reviewing the evidence brought
out by the inquest, and criticising the action of the jury, but
producing nothing new. Occasionally he left the piano and paced the
floor, smoking interminably, lighting the fresh cigarette from the stub
of the old, obviously strung to the limit of his nervous strength.
Hastings detected a little twitching of the muscles at the corners of
his mouth, and the too frequent winking of his eyes.

Judge Wilton had told him, Webster continued, of Mrs. Brace's charge
that he wanted to marry Miss Sloane because of financial pressure; there
was not a word of truth in it; he had already arranged for a loan to
make that payment when it fell due. He was, however, aware of his
unenviable position, and he wanted to give the detective every
assistance possible, in that way assuring his own prompt relief from
embarrassment.

By this time, Hastings had mapped out his line of questioning, his
assault on Webster's reticence.

"That's the right idea!" he said, getting to his feet. "Let's go to
work."

They saw the change in him. Instead of the genial, drawling, slow-moving
old fellow who had seemed thankful for anything he might chance to
hear, they were confronted now by an aroused, quick-thinking man whose
words came from him with a sharp, clipped-off effect, and whose
questions scouted the whole field of their possible and probable
information. He stood leaning his elbows on the other end of the piano,
facing Webster across the polished length of its broad top. His
dominance of the night before, in the library, had returned.

"Now, Mr. Webster," he began, innocent of threat, "as things stack up at
present, only two people had the semblance of a motive for killing
Mildred Brace--either Eugene Russell killed her out of jealousy of you;
or you killed her to silence her demands. Do you see that?"

He had put back his head a little and was peering at Webster under his
spectacle-rims, down the line of his nose. He saw how the other fought
down the impulse to deny, hesitating before answering, with a laugh on a
high note, like derision:

"I suppose that's what a lot of people will say."

"Precisely. Now, I've just had a talk with this Russell--caught him
after the inquest. I believe there's something rotten