hem," interrupted Mulligan. "I know 'em. They're all right,
so I let 'em go. We can get 'em after they finish their routes."

"Um," assented Thong. "Anything gone from the store?" he asked Darcy.

"I haven't looked."

"Better take a look around. It's probably a robbery. You know the
stock, don't you?"

"As well as she did herself. I've been doing the buying lately."

"Well, have a look. Who's that at the door?" he asked sharply, for a
knock as of authority sounded--different from the aimless and impatient
kickings and tappings of the wet throng outside.

"It's Daley from the Times," reported Mulligan, peering out. "He's all
right. Shall I let him in?"

"Oh, yes, I guess so," assented Carroll, with a glance at Thong, who
confirmed, by a nod of his head, what his partner said. "He'll give us
what's right. Let him in."

The reporter entered, nodded to the detectives, gave a short glance at
the body, a longer one at Darcy, poked Mulligan in the ribs, lighted a
cigarette, which he let hang from one lip where it gyrated in eccentric
circles as he mumbled:

"What's the dope?"

"Don't know yet," answered Carroll. "The old lady's dead--murdered it
looks like--and--"

"What's that?" interrupted Thong. "What's that ticking sound?"

"It's the watch--in her hand," replied Darcy, and his voice was a
hoarse whisper.

CHAPTER II

KING'S DAGGER

Carroll and Thong, proceeding along the lines they usually followed in
cases like this, keeping to the rules which had come to them through
the instructions of superior officers, and some which they had worked
out for themselves, had, in a comparatively short time, ascertained the
name, age and somewhat of the personal history of Mrs. Amelia Darcy,
together with that of her cousin, as the detectives called him, though
the relationship was not as close as that.

Mrs. Darcy, who was sixty-five years of age, had carried on the jewelry
business of her husband, Mortimer Darcy, after his death, which
preceded her more tragic one by about seven years. Mortimer Darcy had
been a diamond salesman for a large New York house in his younger days,
and had come to be an expert in precious stones. Many good wishes, and
not a little trade, had gone to him from his former employers, and some
of their customers bought of him when he went into business for himself
in the thriving city of Colchester.

Knowing that to start anew in a strange town would mean uphill work for