pose; but shall adhere to a plain statement of
the facts, in every particular, as they successively discovered
themselves to me. That it will prove an entertaining tale I do not
promise, but that it will be a curious and interesting one I feel sure,
and especially so to those who by profession are brought in contact with
crime in its various phases.

CONTENTS

I.--A SOLILOQUY

II.--A GAME OF CARDS

III.--A TRAGEDY

IV.--THE SUSPECT

V.--THE INQUEST

VI.--THE INQUEST CONCLUDED

VII.--AN EVENING AT THE CLUB

VIII.--THE PROSECUTION AND THE PRISONER

IX.--A CLUE AND A CONFERENCE

X.--THE TRIAL

XI.--THE TRIAL CONCLUDED

XII.--AN EPISODE AND A DINNER

XIII.--THE TRUTH AT LAST

XIV.--THE DEATH OF WINTERS

A MASTER HAND

CHAPTER I

A SOLILOQUY

On a Monday evening in January, 1883, I had returned comparatively late
from work in the District Attorney's office in New York, and was in my
rooms at the Crescent Club on Madison Square, corner of Twenty-sixth
Street, making a leisurely toilet for dinner, when a note was brought me
from Arthur White. In it he asked me to join a few mutual friends at his
rooms on West Nineteenth Street off Fifth Avenue later in the evening
for supper. He named the men--Gilbert Littell, Ned Davis, and Oscar Van
Bult--who were to join him at euchre before supper. This was a favorite
pastime with them, and I was bidden to come early, if I wished, and look
on.

I did not play cards myself; not because of any scruples on the
subject,--I had knocked about, a bachelor, long enough to take most
things in a man's life as they come,--but because I did not care for
games of any sort. I was, however, by my friends considered an
unobjectionable onlooker--rather a rare reputation to enjoy, I may
mention,--probably mine because I did not take sufficient interest in
the play to either advise or criticise. It was not unpleasant, however,
to sit by in White's attractive quarters and drink and smoke from his
excellent sideboard. So having nothing better to do, I sent back word I
would come, and getting into my evening clothes, went down to my dinner.
It was not often I dined alone, as dinner to me was the occasion of the
day and I deemed it incomplete, no matter how excellent the meal,
without some congenial companion; but this evening I was later than
usual, and so found no one available. Ev