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 lay an innocent guest open to annoying questions that would mean nothing after all.

The only thing that the detective had any hope of using was the glove. He felt vaguely that much could be learned from a woman’s glove, but though he had examined it carefully inside and out, he could read nothing from it. To him it was a glove—a long, white kid glove—that was all.

The beads, the spangles, too, all merely meant the presence of various guests who had worn them—they were in no way indicative.

Hairpins—what could be read from them?

Had any of the other women a chance to enter and lean over the body?

Not that Babcock knew of.

Then there was the foolish little tinsel dagger, there was a man’s glove, several cigarette stubs—oh, pshaw, none of these things could mean anything. The thing to do was to find Thomas Locke, and it must be done.

Doctor Babcock voiced this as his ultimate conclusion. He declared that, in his opinion this consideration and discussion of hairpins and men’s gloves got them nowhere. Now, he would only ask questions that definitely concerned the personality, the character, and the possible whereabouts of Locke himself. And he asked that if anybody knew anything—anything at all, bearing on those things, he would immediately disclose such knowledge.

There was a slight stir in the back part of the room, and a feminine voice said, “I may be able to tell something of interest.”

The speaker was a quiet looking little woman, who gave her name as Eleanor Goodwin. She stated that she lived in the house next door, and that being often lonely, she frequently amused herself looking out of her windows at her neighbors.