at I ought to say that," went on Chandler.
"He had me up in his dressing-room, and was very considerate-like to
me while I was telling him."

"Have a bit of something now?" she said suddenly.

"Oh, no, I couldn't eat anything," he said hastily. "I don't feel
as if I could ever eat anything any more."

"That'll only make you ill." Mrs. Bunting spoke rather crossly,
for she was a sensible woman. And to please her he took a bite
out of the slice of bread-and-butter she had cut for him.

"I expect you're right," he said. "And I've a goodish heavy day
in front of me. Been up since four, too--"

"Four?" she said. "Was it then they found--" she hesitated a
moment, and then said, "it?"

He nodded. "It was just a chance I was near by. If I'd been half
a minute sooner either I or the officer who found her must have
knocked up against that--that monster. But two or three people
do think they saw him slinking away."

"What was he like?" she asked curiously.

"Well, that's hard to answer. You see, there was such an awful
fog. But there's one thing they all agree about. He was carrying
a bag--"

"A bag?" repeated Mrs. Bunting, in a low voice. "Whatever sort of
bag might it have been, Joe?"

There had come across her--just right in her middle, like--such a
strange sensation, a curious kind of tremor, or fluttering.

She was at a loss to account for it.

"Just a hand-bag," said Joe Chandler vaguely. "A woman I spoke to
--cross-examining her, like--who was positive she had seen him,
said, 'Just a tall, thin shadow--that's what he was, a tall, thin
shadow of a man--with a bag.'"

"With a bag?" repeated Mrs. Bunting absently. "How very strange
and peculiar--"

"Why, no, not strange at all. He has to carry the thing he does
the deed with in something, Mrs. Bunting. We've always wondered how
he hid it. They generally throws the knife or fire-arms away, you
know."

"Do they, indeed?" Mrs. Bunting still spoke in that absent, wondering
way. She was thinking that she really must try and see what the
lodger had done with his bag. It was possible--in fact, when one
came to think of it, it was very probable--that he had just lost
it, being so forgetful a gentleman, on one of the days he had gone
out, as she knew he was fond of doing, into the Regent's Park.

"There'll be a description circulated in an hour or two," went on
Chandler. "Perhaps that'll help catch him. There isn't a London
man or woman, I don't suppose, who woul