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was holding Eben there also.
    Two of the maids were elderly women and had been there for years; Ellen the cook and Jennie the waitress. Only Peggy the young housemaid was a comparative newcomer, but none the less shocked and stricken. All three of them were crying with the ease and facility of people who know that tears are expected of them, but as I looked Peggy pointed to the doorsill and gave a smothered cry.
    “Blood!” she cried.
    Lynch told her gruffly to keep still, and so we stood until one of the detectives came out into the hall. He surveyed the drooping group grimly.
    “And now,” he said, “let’s hear about it.”
    There was apparently nothing to hear. Ellen had been beating up a cake on the back porch, and Jennie had been cleaning silver, also on the porch for coolness. Peggy was off that afternoon, and had been about to leave by the kitchen door when they heard Miss Emily screaming. None of them had seen Mrs. Lancaster since Jennie had carried up her tray at half past one o’clock, and all of them swore that all the doors, front, rear and side, had been locked.
    The detective took Eben last.
    “Where were you?”
    “Where was I when?”
    “When this thing happened.”
    “I don’t know when it happened.”
    “Let’s see your feet.”
    “There’s blood on them most likely. When Miss Emily ran out screaming I thought most likely the old lady had passed away, so when the noise began I came on up here. But Miss Margaret was here ahead of me. She had the door open and was looking in. She told me to see if her mother was still alive, but I didn’t need to go far to know that.”
    “I can corroborate that,” I said. “Eben was cutting the grass near my window. I saw Miss Emily come out, and I sent him in to see what was wrong.”
    I had to explain myself then, and what I had seen from my window. He listened carefully.
    “That’s all you saw?” he asked. “Didn’t see anyone going in or coming out?”
    “No,” I told him; and suddenly for the first time since I had entered the house I remembered Jim Wellington. What I might have done or said then I hardly know now. I remember that my chest tightened and that I felt shaky all at once. But the need did not arise. There was a sound like a mild explosion from the death room at that moment, and one of the maids yelped and turned to run.
    In the resulting explanation, that a flashlight photograph had been made inside the closed room where the body lay, I was asked no more questions. The servants were dismissed and warned not to leave the house, and the detective, whose name I learned later was Sullivan, turned and went into the death chamber again.
    I was left alone in the upper hall, but entirely incapable of thought. I remember hearing Miss Emily’s canary singing loudly in her room and thinking that it was dreadful, that gaiety so close at hand. Then I went, slowly and rather dazedly, down the stairs and out the front door.
    I have no clear recollection of the rest of that afternoon, save that on the way back I met Lydia Talbot on the pavement staring at the police car, with her arms filled with bundles and her face white and shocked.
    “Whatever has happened?” she asked me. “Is it a fire?”
    “Mrs. Lancaster is dead. I’m afraid she’s been murdered, Miss Lydia.”
    She swayed so that I caught her by the arm, and some of her bundles dropped. She made no attempt to pick them up.
    “But I was there,” she said faintly. “I was there this afternoon. I took her some jellied chicken, just after lunch. She was all right then.”
    In the end I took her home, cutting across the Common to save time, and was glad to find that she had rallied somewhat.
    “How was it—was it done?” she asked.
    “I’m not sure. I believe with an axe. Don’t think about it,” I added, as I felt her trembling again. “We can’t help it now.”
    And then she said a strange thing.
    “Well, she was my own sister-in-law, but I never liked her. And I suppose