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“It isn’t for me to suspect, sir. But if he turns out to be the one, I shan’t be overly surprised.”

“You’ve no real reason to think him a criminal?”

“Oh, Lord, no, sir, not that. But when a man goes off and doesn’t come back, and in a few minutes a lady’s found dead, and nobody else on the premises so much as knows who she is—what else is there to think?”

“What, indeed?” said Hutchins. “Now, just one more question, my good man. That lady that went away soon after Mr. Locke, did more follow her?”

“Not till after the alarm was given. Not till folks wanted to get away from a house that had trouble coming to it.”

“But you said the alarm was given almost immediately after Mr. Locke went.”

“Yes—that’s so. Well, I may as well own up I can’t remember exactly. The lady I spoke of w^ent alone; then when the others went, they went more by twos and threes. And they wrent talking excited like in whispers, and seemin’ awful shocked, which wasn’t surprisin’. But the first lady, now, she couldn’t have known about it, for she was smiling and sweet.”

“Did she have on a mask?”

“No, she’d taken that off.”

“And you can’t remember her dress at all?”

“Well—it was white. What I could see of it. But all the ladies wore long, full cloaks or capes that covered up their rig. Specially those who walked.”

“A good many did walk?”

“Oh, yes. You see the Square people are neighborly, and most of ’em live only a few blocks off.”

Concluding he could learn no more from this man,