ything of the kind?" Bobby asked,
"How did it come there?"

"What," Paredes said, "is the commonest form of borrowing in the world,
particularly in a climate where people have frequent colds? I found a
number of your handkerchiefs in your grandfather's bureau. The
handkerchief furnished me with an important clue. It explains, I think,
Jenkins will tell you, the moving of the body. It was obviously the cause
of Howells's death."

"Yes, sir," Jenkins quavered. "Mr. Silas thought he had dropped his own
handkerchief in the room with the body. I don't know how you've found
these things out."

"By adding two and two," Paredes laughed. "In the first place, you must
all realize that we might have had no mystery at all if it hadn't been
for Miss Katherine. For I don't know that Maria could have done much in a
legal way. Silas Blackburn had intended to dispose of the body
immediately, but Miss Katherine heard the panel move and ran to the
corridor. She made Jenkins break down the door, and she sent for the
police. Silas Blackburn was helpless. He was beaten at that moment, but
he did the best he could. He went to Waters, hoping, at the worst, to
establish an alibi through the book-worm who probably wouldn't remember
the exact hour of his arrival. Waters's house offered him, too, a
strategic advantage. You heard him say the spare room was on the ground
floor. You heard him add that he refused to open his door, either asking
to be left alone or failing to answer at all. And he had to return to the
Cedars the next day, for he missed his handkerchief, and he pictured
himself, since he thought it was his own, in the electric chair. I'm
right, Jenkins?"

"Yes, sir. I kept him hidden and gave him his chance along in the
afternoon. He wanted me to try to find the handkerchief, but I didn't
have the courage. He couldn't find it. He searched through the panel all
about the body and the bed."

"That was when Katherine heard," Bobby said, "when we found the body had
been moved."

"It put him in a dreadful way," Jenkins mumbled, "for no one had bothered
to tell me it was young Mr. Robert the detective suspected, and when Mr.
Silas heard the detective boast that he knew everything and would make an
arrest in the morning, he thought about the handkerchief and knew he was
done for unless he took Howells up. And the man did ask for trouble, sir.
Well! Mr. Silas gave it to him to save himself."

"I've never been able to understand," Pared