his desk, opened it, and laid out before the astonished eyes of Mr.
Roberts the freshly printed photograph of himself with which we are
so well acquainted, and then the half-demolished one which for all its
imperfections showed that it had been originally struck off from the same
negative.

"Do you recognize this portrait of yourself as one taken by Fredericks
some dozen years ago?"

"Certainly. But this other? This end and corner of what must have been my
picture too, where was _it_ found?"

"Ah, that is what I have called you here to learn. This remnant of what
you have just admitted to have been your photograph also was found in the
very condition in which you see it now, in the wastebasket of the room
where Madame Duclos lodged previous to her flight to the Catskills."

"This! with the face----"

"Just that! With the face riddled out of it by bullets! She shot six into
it at intervals; waiting for the passing of an elevated train by her
windows, in the hope that the bigger noise would drown the lesser."

"It is nothing," was Mr. Roberts' indignant comment, as he brushed the
picture aside. "That was never my picture, or she wanted a target for her
skill and didn't care what she took. That is all I have to say to you or
to the Coroner of Greene County, on a matter in which I have no concern.
I am sorry to disappoint both of you, but it is so."

He rose, and the Coroner did not seek to detain him. He merely observed,
as the director turned to go:

"Have you heard the latest news about Mrs. Taylor?"

"No."

"She is improving rapidly. Soon she will be able to appear before the
jury already chosen to inquire into the cause and manner of Miss
Willetts' death."

"A fine woman!" came in a burst from the director's lips as he faced
about for a good-bye nod. "I don't know when I have seen one I admired
more."

And Coroner Price had nothing to say, he was stupefied.

But it was not so with Mr. Gryce, who entered immediately upon Mr.
Roberts' departure.

"Not a jarring note," he remarked. Evidently he had heard the whole
conversation. "I never for a moment imagined that he knew Madame Duclos.
Any knowledge we gain of her will have to come from Mrs. Taylor."

"He's a strong man. We shall find it difficult to hold our own against
him if we are brought to an actual struggle."

"Why did he run the forefinger of his right hand so continuously into his
right-hand vest pocket?" was Mr. Gryce's sole comment.

By w