nd I know him!... The man who murdered Ordez
made a fatal blunder... He used a sign of God in the service of the
devil and he is ruined!"

The big man stepped slowly backward into the room, while my father's
voice, filling the big empty spaces of the house, followed after him.

"You are lost, Zindorf! Satan is insulted, and God is outraged! You are
lost!"

There was a moment's silence; from outside came the sound of men and
horses. The notes of the girl, light, happy, ascended from the lower
chamber, as she sang about her preparations for the journey. Zindorf
continued to step awfully backward. And Lucian Morrow, shaken and sober,
cried out in the extremity of fear:

"In God's name, Pendleton, what do you mean; Zindorf, using a sign of
God in the service of the devil."

And my father answered him:

"The corpse of Ordez lay in the bare cut of the abandoned road, and
beside it, bedded in the damp clay where he had knelt down to rifle the
pockets of the murdered body, were the patch prints of Zindorf's knees!"

VII. The Fortune Teller

Sir Henry Marquis continued to read; he made no comment; his voice clear
and even.

It was a big sunny room. The long windows looked out on a formal garden,
great beech trees and the bow of the river. Within it was a sort of
library. There were bookcases built into the wall, to the height of a
man's head, and at intervals between them, rising from the floor to the
cornice of the shelves, were rows of mahogany drawers with glass knobs.
There was also a flat writing table.

It was the room of a traveler, a man of letters, a dreamer. On the
table were an inkpot of carved jade, a paperknife of ivory with gold
butterflies set in; three bronze storks, with their backs together, held
an exquisite Japanese crystal.

The room was in disorder--the drawers pulled out and the contents
ransacked.

My father stood leaning against the casement of the window, looking out.
The lawyer, Mr. Lewis, sat in a chair beside the table, his eyes on the
violated room.

"Pendleton," he said, "I don't like this English man Gosford."

The words seemed to arouse my father out of the depths of some
reflection, and he turned to the lawyer, Mr. Lewis.

"Gosford!" he echoed.

"He is behind this business, Pendleton," the lawyer, Mr. Lewis, went on.
"Mark my word! He comes here when Marshall is dying; he forces his way
to the man's bed; he puts the servants out; he locks the door. Now,
what bus