tes over an unprofitable
mental catechism; there were other and more vital matters requiring
immediate attention. I asked Maillot a good many questions, but
elicited no further information germane to the tragedy. So I presently
said:

"Have you any idea what your uncle did with the ruby after having shown
it to you?"

"Well," he returned, with thoughtful deliberation, "there 's the safe.
I suppose, when he disappeared through the curtained alcove last night,
he went at once to his bedroom, got the box from the safe, and when we
separated for the night--well, I don't know; I can't guess. When he
left me in my room, he was still carrying the box in his hand."

"You are positive of that?"

"Yes, positive; for after all that had happened between us, and knowing
as I did what the box contained, I remember very distinctly that I
looked oftener at it than I did at him. The little leather box in his
left hand is more vivid in my memory than any other detail of his
appearance."

"But you can remember how he was dressed?"

"Oh, yes; just as we found him. After bidding me good-night, he
certainly did n't go to bed as he announced he should; he could n't
even have started to undress."

I glanced in Miss Cooper's direction. Her blue eyes were regarding me
with an expression of deep and interested attention, but they also
yielded a faint light of some emotion which materially aided me to a
decision. I can make my position clear only by briefly sketching what
was going on in my own mind.

Why did I hesitate to decide between Maillot and Burke in charging one
or the other of them with the perpetration of this crime?--for crime it
was, beyond a shadow of doubt. Well, there were several reasons, any
one of which was sufficient, to indicate what my attitude toward these
two men should be.

In the first place, both had frankly and without the least hint of
reserve respecting each other's attitude that I had been able to
detect, told stories which they must have known beforehand would tend
strongly to incriminate them; but notwithstanding this fact, they had
given their accounts with a knowledge that if they maintained a strict
silence, I must have remained unable to find this information
otherwise. The hostility between the two--and I could not account for
it--did not explain this willingness, because neither had made an open
attempt to direct suspicion toward the other.

I make a possible exception here: Burke's eni