cceeded
in following the lady into the house.

The sight he met there did not tend to allay his newborn interest. There
she stood in the centre of the sitting-room, tall, resolute, and
commanding, her eyes fixed on the door of the room that contained the
still breathing sufferer, Mr. Orcutt's eyes fixed upon her. It seemed as
if she had asked one question and been answered; there had not been time
for more.

"I do not know what to say in apology for my intrusion," she remarked.
"But the death, or almost the death, of a person of whom we have all
heard, seems to me so terrible that----"

But here Mr. Orcutt interrupted gently, almost tenderly, but with a
fatherly authority which Mr. Byrd expected to see her respect.

"Imogene," he observed, "this is no place for you; the horror of the
event has made you forget yourself; go home and trust me to tell you on
my return all that it is advisable for you to know."

But she did not even meet his glance with her steady eyes. "Thank you,"
she protested; "but I cannot go till I have seen the place where this
woman fell and the weapon with which she was struck. I want to see it
all. Mr. Ferris, will you show me?" And without giving any reason for
this extraordinary request, she stood waiting with that air of conscious
authority which is sometimes given by great beauty when united to a
distinguished personal presence.

The District Attorney, taken aback, moved toward the dining-room door.
"I will consult with the coroner," said he.

But she waited for no man's leave. Following close behind him, she
entered upon the scene of the tragedy.

"Where was the poor woman hit?" she inquired.

They told her; they showed her all she desired and asked her no
questions. She awed them, all but Mr. Orcutt--him she both astonished
and alarmed.

"And a tramp did all this?" she finally exclaimed, in the odd, musing
tone she had used once before, while her eye fell thoughtfully to the
floor. Suddenly she started, or so Mr. Byrd fondly imagined, and moved a
pace, setting her foot carefully down upon a certain spot in the carpet
beneath her.

"She has spied something," he thought, and watched to see if she would
stoop.

But no, she held herself still more erectly than before, and seemed, by
her rather desultory inquiries, to be striving to engage the attention
of the others from herself.

"There is some one surely tapping at this door," she intimated, pointing
to the one that opened int