ndoubtedly neither accident nor suicide," he said dryly.

Polly was not aware that she had spoken. What an uncanny habit that
creature had of reading her thoughts!

"You incline to the idea, then, that Mrs. Owen was murdered. Do you know
by whom?"

He laughed, and drew forth the piece of string he always fidgeted with
when unravelling some mystery.

"You would like to know who murdered that old woman?" he asked at last.

"I would like to hear your views on the subject," Polly replied.

"I have no views," he said dryly. "No one can know who murdered the
woman, since no one ever saw the person who did it. No one can give the
faintest description of the mysterious man who alone could have
committed that clever deed, and the police are playing a game of blind
man's buff."

"But you must have formed some theory of your own," she persisted.

It annoyed her that the funny creature was obstinate about this point,
and she tried to nettle his vanity.

"I suppose that as a matter of fact your original remark that 'there are
no such things as mysteries' does not apply universally. There is a
mystery--that of the death in Percy Street, and you, like the police,
are unable to fathom it."

He pulled up his eyebrows and looked at her for a minute or two.

"Confess that that murder was one of the cleverest bits of work
accomplished outside Russian diplomacy," he said with a nervous laugh.
"I must say that were I the judge, called upon to pronounce sentence of
death on the man who conceived that murder, I could not bring myself to
do it. I would politely request the gentleman to enter our Foreign
Office--we have need of such men. The whole _mise en scene_ was truly
artistic, worthy of its _milieu_--the Rubens Studios in Percy Street,
Tottenham Court Road.

"Have you ever noticed them? They are only studios by name, and are
merely a set of rooms in a corner house, with the windows slightly
enlarged, and the rents charged accordingly in consideration of that
additional five inches of smoky daylight, filtering through dusty
windows. On the ground floor there is the order office of some stained
glass works, with a workshop in the rear, and on the first floor landing
a small room allotted to the caretaker, with gas, coal, and fifteen
shillings a week, for which princely income she is deputed to keep tidy
and clean the general aspect of the house.

"Mrs. Owen, who was the caretaker there, was a quiet, respectable woman,
who eke