"Will you please tell me exactly what has taken place while I bathe my face and change my dress?"

"What wonderful self-command you have, my dear!" said Mrs. Sellars admiringly; "it's a thing I never have had. I'm sure when Bunson met me at the door to say that Martha was lying in the drawing-room with her jugular bleeding and all the blood out of her body--not that she ever had much, poor dear!--you might have knocked me down with a feather. I was fit for nothing, and it was Sammy who sent for the police. Fancy! how good of him, my dear, seeing that he had the success of his drama on his mind. And it is a very great success, I can----"

"What did Bunson say?" demanded Patricia, keeping Mrs. Sellars to the point from which, confused by trouble, she constantly strayed.

"He met me and the rest at the door, my dear, when we came back from the theatre at eleven," replied Mrs. Sellars, trying to calm herself. "His face was as white as a clown's, but it was fear and not chalk with Bunson. He and Matilda and Sarah and Eliza got back at a quarter to eleven, so that the supper might be seen to. And no one has eaten the supper," cried Mrs. Sellars, again going off at a tangent. "Such a lovely supper, too! We expected to have such a happy evening, and here is Martha lying on her bed a gory corpse, with all the bedrooms upset by the villain!"

"What villain?"

"Him who murdered poor Martha, whoever he is, the scoundrel. He first stabbed Martha in the drawing-room, and then hunted all through the bedrooms, making hay, as the boys say, in every one. Just look at your own, my dear."

Miss Carrol had already done so, but she had hitherto believed that the open drawers, with their tumbled contents, the disordered wardrobe, and the displaced furniture, had been the work of Mrs. Sellars. "I thought you had done this when you were attending to me."

"But why should I?" demanded Mrs. Sellars, somewhat tartly. "It wouldn't have done you any good to have pulled your room to pieces in this way. The police say he wanted something."

"Who wanted something?"

"The caitiff who robbed Martha of her life," retorted the ex-actress in her best theatrical manner. "He murdered the poor dear for something, and as it wasn't on her--whatever it is--he searched the house. Whether he got it or not--whatever it is--I can't say, nor can anyone else. But he went out by the front door, in spite of the drawing-room 

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