d with a curiously sarcastic smile such as his lips
had seldom shown, he coldly asked:

"And by what stretch of probability do you pick me out for this attack?
There were other men and women in this court, some very near me if I
remember rightly. In what are their characters superior, or their claims
to respect greater, that you should thus single me out as the fool or
knave who could not only commit so wild and despicable an act, but go so
far in folly--let alone knavery--as to conceal it afterward?"

"No evidence has been found against the others you have named which could
in any way connect them with this folly--or shall we say knavery, since
you yourself have made use of the word. But hard as it is for me to say
this, in a presence so highly esteemed, this is not true of you, Mr.
Roberts, however high are our hopes that you will have such explanations
ready as will relieve our minds from further doubts, and send us home
rejoicing. Shall I be frank in stating the precise reasons which seem
to justify our present presumption?"

The director bowed, the same curious smile giving an unnatural expression
to his mouth.

"Let me begin then," the other continued, "by reading to you a list of
questions made out at Headquarters, as a test by which suspicion might be
conscientiously held or summarily dismissed. They are few in number," he
added, as he unfolded a slip of paper taken from his vest pocket. "But
they are very vital, Mr. Roberts. Here is the first:

"'Whose hand carried the bow from cellar to gallery?'"

The director remained silent; but the oppression of that silence was
difficult for them all to endure.

"This the second:

"'Was it the same that carried the arrow from one gallery to another?'"

Still no word; but Mr. Gryce, who was watching Mr. Roberts' every move
without apparently looking up from the knob of his own cane, turned
resolutely aside; the strain was too great. How long could such
superhuman composure endure? And which word of all that were to come
would break it?

Meanwhile, the District Attorney was reading the third question.

"'Is it possible for an arrow, shot through the loophole made by the
curving in of the vase, to reach the mark set for it by Mr. Travis'
testimony?'

"That question was answered when Mr. La Fleche made his experiments from
behind the two pedestals. It could not have been done from the one behind
which Mr. Travis crouched, but was entirely possible from the rear