from the premises--the lodgings being less desirable since the supposed
murder. The faces which thrust themselves out of the doorways as the two
visitors passed, were strange ones.

Marcus felt his heart palpitating, and his face growing pale, as they
ascended the last flight of stairs, at the head of which were the room
and the mystery. The lodgings had not been taken. The rent had been paid
by Mr. Minford up to the 1st of May; and no person had been sufficiently
charmed with the apartments to hire them since that date.

Upon the door was a placard, announcing that the key could be obtained
by application to the floor below. Tiffles went for it, and returned
accompanied by an old woman, who looked as if she knew a great deal
which she did not care to tell. She had been requested by the landlord
to show the apartments to applicants, but not to whisper a word about
the murder; and she was almost bursting with her great secret. While the
old woman was wondering how much longer she would be able to hold in,
Marcus and Tiffles entered the front room, and quietly closed the door
in her face. The old woman grumbled at this discourtesy but, as she had
a superstitious objection to putting her foot in a room where a murder
had been committed, she leaned against the banisters of the stairs, and
waited for the visitors' reappearance.

The room looked just as it did on the day of the inquest. The faded and
worn furniture was all there; the yellow curtains still covered the
windows; the clock still hung against the wall, tickless. Marcus's eyes
glanced restlessly about the room for a moment, not daring to look at
the spot where the old man had received his death blow. But an
inevitable magnetism soon brought his eyes to it, and his heart was
lightened as he saw that the blood stains had been carefully wiped out.

The door of the adjoining room--the maiden's bedchamber--was ajar.
Marcus pushed it open with that slow motion which is a token of delicacy
and respect. The general appearance of the room was unchanged, as well
as Marcus could recollect from the occasional glimpses of it which he
had formerly stolen. The little row of dresses which hung on pegs in a
corner, and a few simple ornaments, might have been removed, but nothing
more. Marcus felt that he was intruding here, and he closed the door.

In the mean time, Wesley Tiffles had been examining the mysterious
machine, which stood undisturbed in its corner, with the protect