either. It's something else." She hesitated. "She's
very obstinate," she added.

When I went away I was aware that her eyes followed me, anxious and
thoughtful eyes, with something of Miss Emily's own wide-eyed gaze.

Willie came late the next evening. I had indeed gone up-stairs to retire
when I heard his car in the drive. When I admitted him, he drew me into
the library and gave me a good looking over.

"As I thought!" he said. "Nerves gone, looks gone. I told you Maggie
would put a curse on you. What is it?"

So I told him. The telephone he already knew about. The confession he
read over twice, and then observed, characteristically, that he would be
eternally--I think the word is "hornswoggled."

When I brought out "The Handwriting of God," following Mrs. Graves's
story of the books, he looked thoughtful. And indeed by the end of the
recital he was very grave.

"Sprague is a lunatic," he said, with conviction. "There was a body, and
it went into the river in the packing-case. It is distinctly possible
that this Knight--or Wright--woman, who owned the handkerchief, was the
victim. However, that's for later on. The plain truth is, that there was
a murder, and that Miss Emily is shielding some one else."

And, after all, that was the only immediate result of Willie's visit--a
new theory! So that now it stood: there was a crime. There was no crime.
Miss Emily had committed it. Miss Emily had not committed it. Miss Emily
had confessed it, but some one else had committed it.

For a few hours, however, our attention was distracted from Miss Emily
and her concerns by the attempted robbery of the house that night.
I knew nothing of it until I heard Willie shouting downstairs. I was
deeply asleep, relaxed no doubt by the consciousness that at last there
was a man in the house. And, indeed, Maggie slept for the same reason
through the entire occurrence.

"Stop, or I'll fire!" Willie repeated, as I sat up in bed.

I knew quite well that he had no weapon. There was not one in the house.
But the next moment there was a loud report, either a door slamming or a
pistol-shot, and I ran to the head of the stairs.

There was no light below, but a current of cool night air came up the
staircase. And suddenly I realized that there was complete silence in
the house.

"Willie!" I cried out, in an agony of fright. But he did not reply. And
then, suddenly, the telephone rang.

I did not answer it. I know now why it rang, that