When he reached the landing, I turned the handle,
and we entered the room together, closing the door after us. The blind
was still down, and in the dim, uncertain light nothing out of the
common was, at first, to be seen. The shabby little room looked trim and
orderly enough, save for a heap of cast-off feminine clothing piled upon
a chair. The bed appeared undisturbed except by the half-seen shape of
its occupant, and the quiet face, dimly visible in its shadowy corner,
might have been that of a sleeper but for its utter stillness and for a
dark stain on the pillow by its side.

Dr. Hart stole on tiptoe to the bedside, while Thorndyke drew up the
blind; and as the garish daylight poured into the room, the young
surgeon fell back with a gasp of horror.

"Good God!" he exclaimed; "poor creature! But this is a frightful thing,
sir!"

The light streamed down upon the white face of a handsome girl of
twenty-five, a face peaceful, placid, and beautiful with the austere and
almost unearthly beauty of the youthful dead. The lips were slightly
parted, the eyes half closed and drowsy, shaded with sweeping lashes;
and a wealth of dark hair in massive plaits served as a foil to the
translucent skin.

Our friend had drawn back the bedclothes a few inches, and now there was
revealed, beneath the comely face, so serene and inscrutable, and yet so
dreadful in its fixity and waxen pallor, a horrible, yawning wound that
almost divided the shapely neck.

Thorndyke looked down with stern pity at the plump white face.

"It was savagely done," said he, "and yet mercifully, by reason of its
very savagery. She must have died without waking."

"The brute!" exclaimed Hart, clenching his fists and turning crimson
with wrath. "The infernal cowardly beast! He shall hang! By God, he
shall hang!" In his fury the young fellow shook his fists in the air,
even as the moisture welled up into his eyes.

Thorndyke touched him on the shoulder. "That is what we are here for,
Hart," said he. "Get out your notebook;" and with this he bent down over
the dead girl.

At the friendly reproof the young surgeon pulled himself together, and,
with open notebook, commenced his investigation, while I, at Thorndyke's
request, occupied myself in making a plan of the room, with a
description of its contents and their arrangements. But this occupation
did not prevent me from keeping an eye on Thorndyke's movements, and
presently I suspended my labours to watch