is
return.

But Sylvia saw. In face and manner his excitement was obvious. Mindful
of that episode she feared that he was again in his cups. Yet
immediately, though for a moment, a question which he asked reassured
her. She understood, or thought she did, why he had come.

"Did you know that you had lost your pearls?"

Instinctively the girl's hand went to her throat.

"Here they are. They were found somewhere. In the hall, I think."

"Thank you, Arthur. This is very good of you. But tomorrow would have
done."

She did not ask him in and this omission he did not appear to notice.
He looked about the hall and then at the girl. At the look her fear
returned.

"Did you know about Fanny and Loftus?" he suddenly asked. "They're
going to elope." As he spoke he leaned back heavily against the door.
"I shall kill him," he added thickly.

Sylvia wrung her hands. "Oh, Arthur, you have been drinking again. You
promised that you never would."

"I shall kill him," Annandale stubbornly repeated.

"Oh, don't say such things," the girl pleaded. "Don't say them. Go
home."

Annandale turned sullenly, opened the door and looking back, muttered,
"I have no home."

Closing the door after him he started down the steps. They were few
and wide, easy of descent. But they had become unaccountably steep. He
caught at a rail. It steadied him. He stood there a moment. Then, a
bit uncertainly, he zigzagged on.

CHAPTER V

EXIT FANNY

"Murder!"

On the morrow, through the thick streets newsboys were shouting the
word engagingly, as though it were something nice. For further
temptation they bawled, "In Gramercy Park!"

Orr was leaving his office. It was four o'clock. He was on his way
home. But the name detained him. Murder in Gramercy Park was a novelty
which no one aware of its sedateness could comfortably resist. He
bought an extra. There, for his penny, in leaded type it stood. In
ink, appropriately red, meagre details followed. As these sprang at
him, mentally he bolted. Other purchasers were absorbing them
pleasurably. A good old-fashioned crime is so rare! Then, too, of all
crimes murder in Gramercy Park is rarest. Yet when in addition the
victim is a man of fashion what more would you have for a cent?

To Orr the information was excessive. It concerned Royal Loftus, who,
the paper stated, had been found early that morning, near a bench in
the park, doubled in a heap, a bullet through his handsome head.

No c