noticed that Kennedy was watching Dr. Blythe rather keenly and,
somehow, I fell to trying to fathom both his story and himself, without,
I confess, any result.

"I should like to look her apartment over," remarked Craig with
alacrity, needing no second invitation to take up a mystery that already
promised many surprises.

The New Studio Apartments were in a huge twelve-story ornate Renaissance
affair on upper Park Avenue, an example of the rapidly increasing
co-operative idea which the impractical artistic temperament has proved
soundly practical.

It was really a studio building, too, designed for those artists who
preferred luxury and convenience to the more romantic atmosphere of the
"Alley"--which is the way the initiated refer to the mews back of
Washington Square, known as Macdougal's Alley, famous in fact and
fiction.

Rhoda Fleming's was a most attractively arranged suite, with a large
studio commanding the north light and having a ceiling twice as high as
the ordinary room, which allowed of the other rooms being, as it were,
on two floors, since their ceilings were of ordinary height. On every
side, as we entered, we could see works of art in tasteful profusion.

Since the removal of the body of the beautiful but unfortunate young art
student, no one had been left there, except the maid, Leila. Leila was
herself a very pretty girl, one of those who need neither fine clothes
nor expensive jewels to attract attention. In fact she had neither. I
noticed that she was neatly and tastefully dressed, however, and wore a
plain gold band on the ring finger of her left hand. She seemed to be
heartbroken over the death of her mistress, but how much of it was
genuine, I could not say, though I am frank to admit that even before I
saw her I had determined that she was worth watching.

"Show me just how you discovered Miss Fleming," asked Kennedy of Dr.
Blythe, getting down to work immediately.

"Why," he replied, "when I got here she was lying half across that
divan, as if she had fallen there, fainting. Each time a little table
had been set for a light dinner and the dinner had been eaten. The
remains were on the table. And," Blythe added significantly, "each time
there was a place set for another person. That person was gone."

Kennedy had turned inquiringly to Leila.

"I was engaged only for the day," she answered modestly. "Evenings when
Mademoiselle had a little party she would often pay me extra to come
bac