g which made it necessary for you to
get to him?"

"Yes. I remembered that he had in his pocket the check for my suit-case!
He had checked it himself that day. I realized in a flash that there
would be a police investigation--and the minute that checkroom stub was
found, the detectives would have followed it up. They would have
discovered my suit-case. My name would then have been indelibly linked
with his--in--in that way--

"So there were two reasons why I knew I must get into that taxicab: to
recover the suit-case check--and to either assure myself that he was
dead, or else take him where he could get expert medical attention.
Almost before I knew what I was doing I seized his suit-case, which he
had left on the floor of the waiting room. I left the station along with
several passengers who had come in on the local train. I called the
taxicab--I told him to drive me to some place on East End Avenue--gave
him some address which I knew was a long distance away--so that I would
have time to learn if he was dead--and if he wasn't, to get him to a
doctor's; and if he was, to find the check--the finding of which in his
pocket would have connected me with the affair.

"He was dead!" She paused--choked--and went on gamely. "I got out of the
taxicab when it slowed down at a railroad crossing. I walked half the
distance back to town, then caught the last street car home--"

Her voice died away. Carroll relaxed slowly. Then a puzzled frown creased
his forehead--

"The man who did the actual shooting," he said quietly--"have you the
slightest idea as to his identity?"

"No." Her manner was almost indifferent: the strain was over--she was
hardly conscious of what she was saying. "He was smaller than Mr.
Warren--a man of about my husband's size--"

She stopped abruptly! Carroll's gaze grew steely--he made a note of the
expression of horror in her eyes.

"About your husband's size!" he repeated softly.

CHAPTER XXI

CARROLL DECIDES

For a moment she was silent. It was patent that she was groping
desperately for the correct thing to say. And finally she extended a
pleading hand--

"Please--don't think that!"

"What?"

"That is was--was my husband. He wouldn't--"

"Why not?"

"Anyway--it is impossible. He was in Nashville. He didn't get home
until morning."

Carroll shook his head. "I hope he can prove he was in Nashville. We have
tried to prove it, and we cannot. And you must admit, Mrs. Lawrence, tha