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 "There you are," said the Coroner to the plain-clothes man, "an air-tight alibi."

The detective regarded him for a moment with supreme contempt. Then he stepped forward and jerked the sheet from Serena's face, which lay upon the pillow as immobile as a model done in brown clay

"You know damn well that you were out yesterday!" he snapped. "I have a good mind to get the wagon and carry you in."

Silence followed.

"What do you say to that?" he demanded.

But Serena had nothing to say, and neither had her handmaidens.

Then he turned a menacing frown upon them, as they sat motionless with lowered eyes.

"Well!"

They jumped slightly, and their eyes showed white around the iris. Suddenly they began to speak, almost in unison.

"We swear tuh Gawd, we done been hyuh wid she t'ree day."

"Oh, Hell!" said the exasperated detective. "What's the use? You might as well argue with a parrot-cage."

"That woman is just as ill at this moment as you are," he said to his unenthusiastic associate when they were again in the sunlight.