s head was
down very close to it, but what he did to it or to the decanter either,
I am sure, sirs, I don't know, for I was that frightened at seeing this
spectre in the room master had kept locked all day, that I just slipped
off the balcony and ran round the house to find Mr. Hartley. But you
wasn't in the parlors, sir, nor Miss Carrie neither, and when I got to
this room, there was master lying dead on the floor, and everybody
crowding around him horror-struck."

"Humph!" ejaculated the doctor, looking at Uncle Joe, who had sunk in a
heap into the arm-chair his nephew abstractedly pushed toward him.

"You see, sirs," Jonas resumed, with great earnestness, "Mr. Benson, for
some reason or other, had been very particular about keeping his own
room to-day. The library door was locked as early as six this morning,
and he would let no one in without first asking who was there. That's
why I felt so dumbfoundered at seeing this yellow man in the room;
besides----"

But no sooner had the good man arrived at this point than he stopped,
with a gasp, and after a quick look at Hartley, flushed, and drew back
in a state of great agitation and embarrassment. Evidently a suspicion
had just crossed the mind of this old and attached servant as to whom
the Yellow Domino might be.

"Well, well," cried the doctor, "go on; let us hear the rest."

"I--I have nothing more to say," mumbled the man, while Hartley, with an
equal display of embarrassment, motioned the discomfited servant to
withdraw, and turned as if to hide his face over some papers on the
table.

"I think the man in the yellow domino had better be found," quoth the
physician, dryly, glancing from Hartley to the departing form of the
servant, with a sharp look. "At all events it would be well enough for
us to know who he is."

"I don't see--" began Uncle Joe, but stopped as he perceived the face of
Hartley Benson slowly composing itself. Evidently he was as much
interested as myself in observing what this not-easily-to-be-understood
man would say and do in this sudden crisis.

We were not long left in doubt.

"Doctor," he began, in a slow, hesitating tone, well calculated to
produce the effect he desired, "we unfortunately already know who wore a
yellow domino this evening. My brother Joe----"

"Hush!" implored his uncle, laying a hand on his nephew's arm with a
quick look of distress not lost on the doctor.

"Brother?" repeated the latter. "Pardon me, I did not