you," he said with quick suspicion. "Isn't that rather a
coincidence? You are a large man."

"Good Heavens," I retorted, stung into fury, "do I look like a man who
would wear this kind of a necktie? Do you suppose I carry purple and
green barred silk handkerchiefs? Would any man in his senses wear a pair
of shoes a full size too small?"

The conductor was inclined to hedge. "You will have to grant that I
am in a peculiar position," he said. "I have only your word as to the
exchange of berths, and you understand I am merely doing my duty. Are
there any clues in the pockets?"

For the second time I emptied them of their contents, which he noted.
"Is that all?" he finished. "There was nothing else?"

"Nothing."

"That's not all, sir," broke in the porter, stepping forward. "There was
a small black satchel."

"That's so," I exclaimed. "I forgot the bag. I don't even know where it
is."

The easily swayed crowd looked suspicious again. I've grown so
accustomed to reading the faces of a jury, seeing them swing from
doubt to belief, and back again to doubt, that I instinctively watch
expressions. I saw that my forgetfulness had done me harm--that
suspicion was roused again.

The bag was found a couple of seats away, under somebody's
raincoat--another dubious circumstance. Was I hiding it? It was brought
to the berth and placed beside the conductor, who opened it at once.

It contained the usual traveling impedimenta--change of linen, collars,
handkerchiefs, a bronze-green scarf, and a safety razor. But the
attention of the crowd riveted itself on a flat, Russia leather wallet,
around which a heavy gum band was wrapped, and which bore in gilt
letters the name "Simon Harrington."

CHAPTER VII. A FINE GOLD CHAIN

The conductor held it out to me, his face sternly accusing.

"Is this another coincidence?" he asked. "Did the man who left you his
clothes and the barred silk handkerchief and the tight shoes leave you
the spoil of the murder?"

The men standing around had drawn off a little, and I saw the absolute
futility of any remonstrance. Have you ever seen a fly, who, in these
hygienic days, finding no cobwebs to entangle him, is caught in a sheet
of fly paper, finds himself more and more mired, and is finally quiet
with the sticky stillness of despair?

Well, I was the fly. I had seen too much of circumstantial evidence to
have any belief that the establishing of my identity would weigh much
against the o