wife, Hancock?"

"That's all, sir."

"Now, where are your rooms?"

"We've two rooms in the basement, sir--living-room and kitchen--and two
rooms on the top floor--a bedroom and a bathroom."

"On the top-floor. How many floors are there?"

"Well, sir, there's the basement--then there's this--then there's two
floors that's used by the clerks--then there's ours."

"That's to say there are two floors between your bedroom and this ground
floor?"

"Yes, sir--two."

"Very well. Now, about last night. What time did you and your wife go to
bed?"

"Eleven o'clock, sir--half an hour later than usual."

"You'd previously looked round, I suppose?"

"Been all round, sir--I always look into every room in the place last
thing at night--thoroughly."

"Are you and your wife sound sleepers?"

"Yes, sir--both of us. Good sleepers."

"You heard no sound after you got to bed?"

"Nothing, sir--neither of us."

"No recollection of hearing a revolver shot?--not even as if it were a
long way off?"

"No, sir--we never heard anything--nothing unusual, at any rate."

"You heard no sound of doors opening or being shut, nor of any
conveyance coming to the door?"

"No, sir, nothing at all."

"Well, one or two more questions, Hancock. You didn't go into the room
after first catching sight of the body? Just so--but you'd notice
things, even in a hurried glance. Did you notice any sign of a
struggle--overturned chair or anything?"

"No, sir. I did notice that Mr. Herapath's elbow chair, that he always
sat in at his desk, was pushed back a bit, and was a bit on one side as
it were. That was all."

"And the light--the electric light? Was that on?"

"No, sir."

"Then all you can tell us comes to this--that you never heard anything,
and had no notion of what was happening, or had happened, until you came
down in the morning?"

"Just so, sir. If I'd known what was going on, or had gone on, I should
have been down at once."

Barthorpe nodded and turned to the coachman.

"Now, Mountain," he said. "We want to hear your story. Be careful about
your facts--what you can tell us is probably of the utmost importance."

CHAPTER IV

THE PRESSMAN

The coachman, thus admonished, unconsciously edged his chair a little
nearer to the table at which Barthorpe Herapath sat, and looked
anxiously at his interrogator. He was a little, shrewd-eyed fellow, and
it seemed to Selwood, who had watched him carefully during the informal