l drew
four or five letters from his breast pocket and handed them to Fleming
Stone.

"They've all been looked over, Mr. Stone," said the district attorney;
"and they have no bearing on the matter of the crime."

"Oh, I don't want to read them," said the detective.

He ran over the lot carelessly, not taking the sheets from the
envelopes, and returned them to their owner.

Gregory Hall looked at him as if fascinated. What revelation was this
man about to make?

"Mr. Hall," Fleming Stone began, "I've no intention of forcing your
secret from you. But I shall ask you some questions, and you may do as
you like about answering them. First, you refuse to tell where you were
during the night last Tuesday. I take it, you mean you refuse to tell
how or where you spent the evening. Now, will you tell us where you
lodged that night?"

"I fail to see any reason for telling you," answered Hall, after a
moment's thought. "I have said I was in New York City, that is enough."

"The reason you may as well tell us," went on Mr. Stone, "is because it
is a very simple matter for us to find out. You doubtless were at some
hotel, and you went there because you could not get a room at your
club. In fact, this was stated when the coroner telephoned for you, the
morning after the murder. I mean, it was stated that the club bed-rooms
were all occupied. I assume, therefore, that you lodged at some hotel,
and, as a canvass of the city hotels would be a simple matter, you may
as well save us that trouble."

"Oh, very well," said Gregory Hall sullenly; "then I did spend the night
at a hotel. It was the Metropolis Hotel, and you will find my name duly
on the register."

"I have no doubt of it," said Stone pleasantly. "Now that you have told
us this, have you any objection to telling us at what time you returned
to the hotel, after your evening's occupation, whatever it may have
been?"

"Eh?" said Hall abstractedly. He turned his head as he spoke, and
Fleming Stone threw me a quizzical smile which I didn't in the least
understand.

"You may as well tell us," said Stone, after he had repeated his
question, "for if you withhold it, the night clerk can give us this
information."

"Well," said Hall, who now looked distinctly sulky, "I don't remember
exactly, but I think I turned in somewhere between twelve and one
o'clock."

"And as it was a late hour, you slept rather late next morning,"
suggested Stone.

"Oh, I don't know. I was at