to the
right.

"So you have found your little veranda!"

"Hello, Miss Copley! You got one too?"

"Yes. I come out here nearly every evening for an hour before going to
bed. I love to watch the stars."

"No dearth of them in these skies."

"If we could look beyond them we might read the Riddle of the Universe.
I think we could--I think so!" Here was the undercurrent of sadness
again, sounding through an odd intensity of tone. "Surely, there is
something beyond them. There must be! What do you think?"

"I know there is. If you sat here long enough, Miss Copley, I believe
your doubts would be set at rest."

"What do you mean? What is behind the stars?"

"The dawn," he told her seriously. "These windows must face due East."
He mused briefly. "They also command a partial view of that kitchen
garden, come to think of it! You didn't happen to see or hear
any--last evening--"

"What a one-track mind!" lamented Miss Ocky. "_No!_"

They talked until very late.

_XVII: An Arrest is Made_

At eleven o'clock the next morning, the ground-floor of the big house
was again invaded by a heterogeneous collection of people drawn thither
by the coroner's inquest into the death of Simon Varr. Some were there
as witnesses or because they had a personal interest in the
proceedings, some because they were part of the legal machinery, and
many because they were driven by morbid curiosity. The Coroner, an
alert, bewhiskered old gentleman named Merton, took possession of the
big living-room and had one end of it fenced off with chairs the better
to mark the dignified exclusiveness of his court.

As on the previous day, the end of the veranda around the corner from
the front of the house escaped the notice of the invading horde.
Creighton spent the early part of the morning there, after a solitary
breakfast, reading the morning paper attentively. Barlow, the editor,
had covered the story of the murder with a competent pencil. The
account was graphic, lucid and comprehensive, a credit to himself and
his paper. When Creighton had finished its careful perusal he was
posted on many details of the case that sheer lack of time had
prevented him from learning the day before. With a considerable degree
of satisfaction, however, he noted that he had unearthed a fair amount
of information that the industrious scribe had missed.

Only second in interest to the big story itself was the half-column on
an inner page de