did not go into my house when I reached it. I was
wide awake, and I perceived, on looking up at my wife's windows, that
the lights were out. As it is her custom to wait up for me on those rare
occasions when I spend an evening away from home, I surmised that she
was comfortably asleep, and made my way to the pharmacy to which the
Wellses' governess had referred.

The night-clerk was in the prescription-room behind the shop. He had
fixed himself comfortably on two chairs, with an old table-cover over
his knee and a half-empty bottle of sarsaparilla on a wooden box beside
him. He did not waken until I spoke to him.

"Sorry to rouse you, Jim," I said.

He flung off the cover and jumped up, upsetting the bottle, which
trickled a stale stream to the floor. "Oh, that's all right, Mr.
Johnson, I wasn't asleep, anyhow."

I let that go, and went at once to the object of our visit. Yes, he
remembered the governess, knew her, as a matter of fact. The Wellses'
bought a good many things there. Asked as to her telephoning, he thought
it was about nine o'clock, maybe earlier. But questioned as to what she
had telephoned about, he drew himself up.

"Oh, see here," he said. "I can't very well tell you that, can I? This
business has got ethics, all sorts of ethics."

He enlarged on that. The secrets of the city, he maintained loftily,
were in the hands of the pharmacies. It was a trust that they kept.
"Every trouble from dope to drink, and then some," he boasted.

When I told him that Arthur Wells was dead his jaw dropped, but there
was no more argument in him. He knew very well the number the governess
had called.

"She's done it several times," he said. "I'll be frank with you. I got
curious after the third evening, and called it myself. You know the
trick. I found out it was the Ellingham, house, up State Street."

"What was the nature of the conversations?"

"Oh, she was very careful. It's an open phone and any one could hear
her. Once she said somebody was not to come. Another time she just said,
'This is Suzanne Gautier. 9:30, please.'"

"And tonight?"

"That the family was going out--not to call."

When I told him it was a case of suicide, his jaw dropped.

"Can you beat it?" he said. "I ask you, can you beat it? A fellow who
had everything!"

But he was philosophical, too.

"A lot of people get the bug once in a while," he said. "They come
in here for a dose of sudden death, and it takes watching. You'd be
s