“I pray,” Bobby answered listlessly, “that you’re right.”

“If there’s any little thing I can do,” Paredes offered formally.

“No, no.  Thanks,” Bobby answered.

He went on to the library.  He glanced with an unpleasant shrinking from the door of the enclosed staircase leading to the private hall just outside the room in which his grandfather lay dead.  There was no fire here, but he wrapped himself in a rug and lay on the broad, high-backed lounge which was drawn close to the fireplace, facing it.  His complete weariness conquered his premonitions, his feeling of helplessness.  The entrance of Jenkins barely aroused him.

“Where are you, Mr. Robert?”

“Here,” Bobby answered sleepily.

The butler walked to the lounge and looked over the back.

“To be sure, sir.  I didn’t see you here.”

He held out a glass.

“Doctor Groom said you were to drink this.  It would make you sleep, sir.”

Bobby closed his eyes again.

“Put it on the table where I can reach it when I want it.”

“Yes, sir.  Mr. Robert!  The policeman?  Did he say anything, if I might make so bold as to ask?”

“Go away,” Bobby groaned.  “Leave me in peace.”

And peace for a little time came to him.  It was the sound of voices in the room that aroused him.  He lay for a time, scarcely knowing where he was, but little by little the sickening truth came back, and he realized that it was Graham and the detective, Howells, who talked close to the window, and Graham had already fulfilled his promise.

Bobby didn’t want to eavesdrop, but it was patent he would embarrass Graham by disclosing himself now, and it was likely Graham would be glad of a witness to anything the detective might say.

It was still light.  A ray from the low sun entered the window and rested on the door of the enclosed staircase.

Graham’s anxious demand was the first thing Bobby heard distinctly—­the thing that warned him to remain secreted.

“I think now with the coroner on his way it’s time you defined your suspicions a trifle more clearly.  I am a lawyer.  In a sense I represent young Mr. Blackburn.  Please tell me why you are so sure his grandfather was murdered.”

“All right,” the detective’s level voice came back.  “Half an hour ago I would have said no again, but now I’ve got the evidence I wanted.  I appreciate, Mr. Graham, that you’re a friend of that young rascal, and what I have to say isn’t pleasant for a friend to hear.  But first you want to know why I’m so sure the case is murder, in spite of the doctor who made his diagnosis without really looking.”

“Go on,” Graham said softly.

Bobby waited—­his nerves as tense as they had grown in the presence of the dead man.