of economy or merely to carry
out some theory of his own, the first lord of Heatherington Hall
did not stick to the general plan.

"In brief, instead of building a tall tower rising from the ground
itself, he chose to erect upon the roof of the west wing of the
building a lower but more commodious one than was customary. That
is to say, that while his tower was less than half the height of
any other in the country, its circumference was twice as great,
and, by reason of the double supply of bowman's slits, equally as
effective in withstanding a siege; and, indeed, doubly difficult to
assault, as before an invading force could get to the door of the
place it would have to fight its way up through the main building
to reach the level of it.

"Now, owing to the peculiarity of its construction--it is not more
than eighteen feet high--the fact that it contained but one circular
room, and all those bowman slits in the walls of it, this unusual
'tower' gained an equally unusual name for itself, and became
known everywhere as the 'Stone Drum of Heatherington,' and is even
mentioned by that name in the _Inquisitio Eliensis_ of the "Domesday
Book," which, as you doubtless know, is the particular volume of
that remarkable work which records the survey, et cetera, of the
counties of Cambridge, Hertford, Essex, Norfolk, Suffolk, and
Huntingdon."

"I see," said Cleek, with an amused twinkle in his eye. "You are
getting on, Mr. Narkom. We shall have you lecturing on archaeology
one of these fine days. But to return to our mutton--or, rather,
our stone drum--was it in that place, then, that the murder was
committed?"

"Yes. It is one of the few, very few, parts of the building to
which Mr. Jefferson P. Drake did nothing in the way of modernizing,
and added nothing in the way of 'improvements.' That, probably,
was because, as it stood, it offered him a quiet, secluded, and
exclusive retreat for the carrying on of his experiments; for
wealth had brought with it no inclination to retire, and he remained
to the last in the lists of the world's active forces. As a general
thing, he did not do much in the way of burning the midnight oil,
but conducted most of his experiments in the daytime. But last
night was an exception. It may be that the news of his son's
appeal to the lodgekeeper that afternoon had upset him, for he was
restless and preoccupied all the evening, Lord Fallowfield says--or,
at least, so young Drake reports him as ha