man--grey-haired--slightly built?" said Ransford. "Dark
clothes--silk hat?"

"Precisely," replied Bryce, who was now considerably astonished. "Do you
know him?"

"I saw such a man entering the Cathedral, a while ago," answered
Ransford. "A stranger, certainly. Come along, then."

He had fully recovered his self-possession by that time, and he led
the way from the surgery and across the Close as if he were going on
an ordinary professional visit. He kept silence as they walked rapidly
towards Paradise, and Bryce was silent, too. He had studied Ransford
a good deal during their two years' acquaintanceship, and he knew
Ransford's power of repressing and commanding his feelings and
concealing his thoughts. And now he decided that the look and start
which he had at first taken to be of the nature of genuine astonishment
were cunningly assumed, and he was not surprised when, having reached
the group of men gathered around the body, Ransford showed nothing but
professional interest.

"Have you done anything towards finding out who this unfortunate
man is?" asked Ransford, after a brief examination, as he turned to
Mitchington. "Evidently a stranger--but he probably has papers on him."

"There's nothing on him--except a purse, with plenty of money in it,"
answered Mitchington. "I've been through his pockets myself: there isn't
a scrap of paper--not even as much as an old letter. But he's evidently
a tourist, or something of the sort, and so he'll probably have stayed
in the city all night, and I'm going to inquire at the hotels."

"There'll be an inquest, of course," remarked Ransford mechanically.
"Well--we can do nothing, Mitchington. You'd better have the body
removed to the mortuary." He turned and looked up the broken stairway
at the foot of which they were standing. "You say he fell down that?" he
asked. "Whatever was he doing up there?"

Mitchington looked at Bryce.

"Haven't you told Dr. Ransford how it was?" he asked.

"No," answered Bryce. He glanced at Ransford, indicating Varner, who had
come back with the constable and was standing by. "He didn't fall," he
went on, watching Ransford narrowly. "He was violently flung out of that
doorway. Varner here saw it."

Ransford's cheek flushed, and he was unable to repress a slight start.
He looked at the mason.

"You actually saw it!" he exclaimed. "Why, what did you see?"

"Him!" answered Varner, nodding at the dead man. "Flung, head and heels,
clean through