suppressed it.

"You know about the letter?" she asked. "The letter I got from
Goldenburg."

He shook his head. "Assume that I know nothing. Begin at the beginning."

"Well, that was the beginning. I did not know it was from Goldenburg
then, for it was unsigned, and both the address and the note itself were
in typewriting. It was delivered by an express messenger. It said that
the writer had something of importance affecting my future happiness to
say to me, and that I could learn what it was by calling at Mr. Grell's
house about ten. The writer advised me to keep my visit as secret as
possible."

"Ah! What time did you get the note?"

"I am not quite sure. It was about half-past nine or quarter to ten."

"Very neatly timed to prevent you making inquiries beforehand. Go on."

"I was perhaps a little frightened and the note piqued my curiosity. The
quickest way to learn what was wrong seemed to me to follow the writer's
instructions. I went to Grosvenor Gardens, where I was apparently
expected, for a man-servant let me in and took me to Mr. Grell's study.
I walked in by myself, not permitting him to announce me. The room was
in semi-darkness, but I could make out a figure on a couch at the other
end of the room. I walked over to it. The face was in shadow, and not
until I was quite close could I see the stain on the shirt front. It
took me a few moments to realise that the man was dead.

"Then I wanted to scream, to call out for help, but I could not. It was
all too terrible--horrible--like a ghastly dream. Gradually my wits and
my senses returned to me. It came into my mind like a flash that the
letter I had received hinted at blackmail. I could not see the dead
man's face."

Her voice died away and she looked a little hesitatingly at the
superintendent. He nodded encouragingly.

"Don't be afraid, Lady Eileen. You had found a dead man in Mr. Grell's
house--a man whom you suspected of blackmailing your fiance. You not
unnaturally thought that he had been killed by Mr. Grell."

"Yes." She was speaking in a lower key now. "I feared that Mr. Grell in
an excess of passion had killed him. What was I to think?" She made a
gesture of helplessness with her hands. "My brain was in a whirl, but I
seemed to see things clearly enough. I dared not raise an alarm, for I
recognised that my evidence as far as it went would be deadly agamst the
man I loved. I laid my hand on the dagger to withdraw it, but at that
moment I he