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S Barry Odell reached the second floor he found himself confronting a woman he had not seen before; a servant evidently from her trim livery. She had just come from one of the side rooms, closing the door quietly behind her; but the detective caught the sound of sobbing and high-pitched feminine tones within, and he concluded it to be occupied by the chagrined Cissie.

The woman who stood regarding him with frank interest and curiosity was about thirty, thin to the point of angularity; and her sharp-chinned, sallow face baffled him with a sense of half recognition. He recalled what Miss Meade had told him of the lady's maid and spoke.

"You are Gerda?"

"Yes, sir," the woman replied quietly, without surprise; and there was an expectant look in her gray-green eyes.

"Come downstairs, please; I want to talk to you."

She followed him without a word to the drawing-room, where she stood before him, ignoring the chair toward which he had made a tentative gesture.

"How long have you been employed here?"

"Six months, sir. That is all."

"You were the personal maid of Mrs. Lorne and Miss Chalmers?"