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242 "Wasn't right!" Odell repeated when he could stem the flow of words. "What sort of a place was she taken to?"

"A loon'tic asylum!" the woman replied with morbid relish. "You could have knocked me down with a feather when I heard it. She told me she was goin' to a san'tarium to rest, though she hadn't done nothin' while she lived here but moon around the house; and she had hardly any callers, only one gentleman as I know of, and him not often. It's funny her friends didn't look her up before, if they was so concerned about her."

"But where was she taken? What sanitarium?" The detective's thoughts were racing now. "On whose advice did she go?"

"How should I know? I ain't never one to poke my nose in the tenants' affairs. She was sad-like when she came, and she kept gettin' droopier and droopier as time went on, but she was always soft-spoken and quiet, and I never saw her do anythin' funny; no more did Agnes, her girl that come in by the day. Except for her, Mis' Gael was all alone. It was after that gentleman who called now and again had been here for the next to the last time that Mis' Gael sent for me and told me she was goin' away to the san'tarium, but she'd be back in a few weeks. She left the next day, and my man helped put her trunk in the taxi. That very afternoon a movin'-van backed up to the door, and the boss of it showed me an order to take out all her things and put them in storage. Her rent was paid up in advance till the end of her lease, so I had nothin' to say; and I ain't heard of her since."

"Who told you that the sanitarium to which Mrs. Gael