oom, followed, as it afterwards appeared,
by the scrub-woman.

The Van Burnam parlors are separated by an open arch. It was to the
right of this arch and in the corner opposite the doorway that the dead
woman lay. Using my eyes, now that I was somewhat accustomed to the
semi-darkness enveloping us, I noticed two or three facts which had
hitherto escaped me. One was, that she lay on her back with her feet
pointing towards the hall door, and another, that nowhere in the room,
save in her immediate vicinity, were there to be seen any signs of
struggle or disorder. All was as set and proper as in my own parlor when
it has been undisturbed for any length of time by guests; and though I
could not see far into the rooms beyond, they were to all appearance in
an equally orderly condition.

Meanwhile the cleaner was trying to account for the overturned cabinet.

"Poor dear! poor dear! she must have pulled it over on herself! But
however did she get into the house? And what was she doing in this great
empty place?"

The policeman, to whom these remarks had evidently been addressed,
growled out some unintelligible reply, and in her perplexity the woman
turned towards me.

But what could I say to her? I had my own private knowledge of the
matter, but she was not one to confide in, so I stoically shook my head.
Doubly disappointed, the poor thing shrank back, after looking first at
the policeman and then at me in an odd, appealing way, difficult to
understand. Then her eyes fell again on the dead girl at her feet, and
being nearer now than before, she evidently saw something that startled
her, for she sank on her knees with a little cry and began examining the
girl's skirts.

"What are you looking at there?" growled the policeman. "Get up, can't
you! No one but the Coroner has right to lay hand on anything here."

"I'm doing no harm," the woman protested, in an odd, shaking voice. "I
only wanted to see what the poor thing had on. Some blue stuff, isn't
it?" she asked me.

"Blue serge," I answered; "store-made, but very good; must have come
from Altman's or Stern's."

"I--I'm not used to sights like this," stammered the scrub-woman,
stumbling awkwardly to her feet, and looking as if her few remaining
wits had followed the rest on an endless vacation. "I--I think I shall
have to go home." But she did not move.

"The poor dear's young, isn't she?" she presently insinuated, with an
odd catch in her voice that gave to the qu