his tone was very
humble as he asked Muller to follow him.

When the detective entered Mrs. Bernauer's room the housekeeper rose
slowly from the large armchair in front of her table. She was very pale
and her eyes were full of terror. She made no move to speak, so Muller
began the conversation. He put down his hat, brought up a chair and
placed it near the window at which the housekeeper had been sitting.
Then he sat down and motioned to her to do the same.

"You are a faithful servant, all too faithful," he began. "But you are
faithful only to your master. You have no devotion for his wife."

"You are mistaken," replied the woman in a low tone.

"Perhaps, but I do not think so. One does not betray the people to whom
one is devoted."

Mrs. Bernauer looked up in surprise. "What--what do you know?" she
stammered.

Muller did not answer the question directly, but continued: "Mrs.
Thorne had a meeting recently with a strange man. It was not their first
meeting, and somehow you discovered it. But before this last meeting
occurred you spoke to the lady's husband about it, and it was arranged
between you that you should give him a signal which would mean to him,
'Your wife is going to the meeting.' Mrs. Thorne did go to the meeting.
This happened on Monday evening at about quarter past nine. Some one,
who was in the neighbourhood by chance, saw a woman's figure hurrying
through the garden, down to the other street, and a moment after this,
the light of this lamp in your window was seen to go out. A hand had
turned down the wick--it was your hand.

"This was the signal to Mr. Thorne. The mirrors over his desk reflected
in his eyes the light he could not otherwise have seen as he sat by his
own window. The signal, therefore, told him that the time had come to
act. This same chance watcher, who had seen the woman going through the
garden, had seen the lamp go out, and now saw a man's figure hurrying
down the path the woman had taken. The man as well as the woman came
from this house and went in the direction of the lower end of the
garden.

"A little while later a shot was heard, and the next morning Leopold
Winkler was found with a bullet in his back. The crime was generally
taken to be a murder for the sake of robbery. But you and I, and Mr.
Herbert Thorne, know very well that it was not.

"You know this since Wednesday noon. Then it was that the idea suddenly
came to you, falling like a heavy weight on your soul, t