“It was a sort of subdued fierceness,” continued Miss Vale—“as though he were setting his face against some invisible force and defying it. When he mentioned our happiness that was to be, I could see his hands close tightly, I could read menace in the set of his jaw. As he was going, he said to me:
“ ‘There has been something—a something that you’ve never been able to understand—keeping us apart. But it is about at an end. Human nature endures a great deal, sometimes, but its endurance does not last forever. Tonight, my dear, puts an end to my endurance. I am going to show what I should have shown long ago—that I’m a man.’
“Then he went away, and I was frightened. All sorts of possibilities presented themselves to me—vague, indefinite, formless terrors. I tried to shake them off, but could not. It became firmly fixed in my mind that something was going to happen—that Allan was about to—to—” here the steady voice faltered once more, “to take a step that would bring danger upon him.
“And that night I went to Mrs. Barron’s as I had promised. I talked to people—I laughed—I even danced. But never for a moment did the fear cease gripping at my heart. At last I could stand it no longer. I felt that I must go to where this danger was confronting Allan; and as the house in Christie Place was the first that arose in my mind, I went there.
“I saw the cab upon the opposite side of the street; and the driver of it looked at me so hard that I drove on without stopping, as the newspaper states. But my courage came back in a few moments; I returned and went in.”
“You halted on the stairs,” said Ashton-Kirk. “Why?”
“Because I saw a light moving about in the hallway above,” answered Miss Vale. Then she added: “But how did you know that I stopped upon the stairs?”
“I did not know it,” replied Ashton-Kirk. “In his story the cab driver says you entered at Hume’s door and went upstairs. I have found that the position which his cab occupied at the time was fully fifteen feet west of Hume’s doorway, making it impossible for him to see whether you went up at once, or not. In the face of what immediately followed your entrance, or rather, what is said to have followed it, I thought it reasonable to suppose that you had stopped!”
“Thank you,” said Miss Vale.
“You say there was a light moving about; but what else did you see?”
“Nothing.”
“But you heard something?”
“Yes; the revolver shot, and then the dreadful cry that followed it.”
Ashton-Kirk unclasped his hands from about his knee, placed them upon the arms of his chair and leaned forward.
“But between the two—after the shot, and before the cry, you heard a door close,” he said.
She gave a little gasp of surprise.
“I did,” she said. “I remember it distinctly now that you mention it. It closed sharply, but not very loudly.”
The investigator leaned back and began drumming upon the arm of his chair with his long supple fingers.
“Experience never quite takes away that comfortable feeling of satisfaction that the proving of a theory gives one,” said he. “I suppose it is a sort of reward that Nature reserves for effort.”
And he smiled at his beautiful visitor’s puzzled look, and went on:
“The cab driver says that the cry resembled that of a parrot or cockatoo. What do you think?”
“It was not unlike their scream,” said Miss Vale. “But I was too much startled to think of comparing it to anything at the time!”
“What happened after you heard this cry?”
“I waited for some little time, part way up the stairs. Then the light which I had seen glancing over the walls and across the ceiling, seemed to halt and die down. After this there was a pause, a stoppage of everything, and fear took possession of me. Suppose Allan had really intended visiting the place—suppose he had preceded me—suppose something dreadful had just happened—something in which he had had a part!
“Filled with thoughts like these, I ascended the remaining stairs. There was a light shining through the lettered glass of the door at the front; but the hall was deserted; the far end was thick with shadows. I tried the door where the light was, but it was fast; the door nearest the stairs was open; I entered by that, and passed into the front room through a communicating doorway. Then I saw the—the body, turned out the light, ran stumbling through the rooms and down the stairs.”
“Why did you turn out the light?” asked the investigator.
“I don’t know. Partly, I suppose, to shut the awful thing upon the floor from my sight—and partly—”
She stopped, but Ashton-Kirk completed the sentence for her.
“And partly with the confused idea that you might hide the deed from public gaze and in that way save Allan Morris from the consequences of his crime,” said he.
At this she sprang up, her hands outstretched appealingly; the fear now plain in her face.
“No, no!” she cried. “He is not guilty! He did not do it!”
“My dear young lady,” said Ashton-Kirk, soothingly, “control yourself. Don’t forget that before this thing is ended you will probably need all the self-command you can summon.” Then as she resumed her seat, he added: “I did not say that he was guilty. I was merely telling you of the formless thought that you had in mind when you turned out the light.”
She sat staring at him, the horror of it all still in her eyes. Then she nodded her head slowly, and said in a husky voice.
“Yes; that is what I thought, and that is why I called you on the telephone. I thought you would pity me and show me some way of covering it all up. But after I had your promise to come, I was seized with the
