d Mrs.
Kebby, and shuffled off to the nearest public house.

Here she began to celebrate the season, and afterwards went shopping;
then she celebrated the season again, and later carried home her
purchases to the miserable garret she occupied. In this den Mrs. Kebby,
with the aid of gin and water, celebrated the season until she drank
herself to sleep.

Next morning she woke in anything but an amiable mood, and had to
fortify herself with an early drink before she was fit to go about her
business.

It was almost nine when she reached the Nelson Hotel, and found the
covered tray with Mr. Berwin's breakfast waiting for her; so she hurried
with it to Geneva Square as speedily as possible, fearful of a scolding.
Having admitted herself into the house, Mrs. Kebby took up the tray with
both hands, and pushed open the sitting-room door with her foot. Here,
at the sight which met her eyes, she dropped the tray with a crash, and
let off a shrill yell.

The room was in disorder, the table was overturned, and amid the
wreckage of glass and china lay Mark Berwin, with outspread hands--stone
dead--stabbed to the heart.

CHAPTER V

THE TALK OF THE TOWN

Nowadays, events, political, social, and criminal, crowd so closely on
one another's heels that what was formerly a nine days' wonder is
scarcely marvelled at the same number of minutes. Yet in certain cases
episodes of a mysterious or unexpected nature engage the attention of a
careless world for a somewhat longer period, and provoke an immense
amount of discussion and surmise. In this category may be placed the
crime committed in Geneva Square; for when the extraordinary
circumstances of the case became known, much curiosity was manifested
regarding the possible criminal and his motive for committing so
apparently useless a crime.

To add to the wonderment of the public, it came out in the evidence of
Lucian Denzil at the inquest that Berwin was not the real name of the
victim; so here the authorities were confronted with a three-fold
problem. They had first to discover the name of the dead man; second, to
learn who it was had so foully murdered him; and third, to find out the
reason why the unknown assassin should have slain an apparently harmless
man.

But these hidden things were not easily brought to light; and the
meagre evidence collected by the police failed to do away with any one
of the three obstacles--at all events, until after the inquest. When the