“Killed, eh?” murmured Carroll, as he bent over the body.

“Gun?” asked Thong, who was making a quick visual inventory of the interior of the place.

“No; doesn’t seem so.  Looks more like her head’s been busted in.  Hit with something.  Doc Warren can ’tend to that end of it.  Now let’s get down to business.  Who found her this way?”

“I did,” answered Darcy.

“And who are you?”

“Her second cousin.  Her name was Mrs. Amelia Darcy, and her husband and my father were first cousins.  I have worked for her about seven years—­ever since just after her husband died.  She continued his business.  It’s one of the oldest in the city and—­”

“Yes, I know all about that.  Robbery here once—­before your time.  We got back some of the stuff for the old lady.  She treated us pretty decent, too.  When’d you find her like this?”

“About half an hour ago.  I got up a little before six o’clock to do some repair work on a man’s watch.  He wanted to get the early train out of town.”

“I see!  And you found the old lady like this?” asked Carroll.

“Just like this—­yes.  Then I called in the milkmen—­”

“I saw them,” interrupted Mulligan.  “I know ’em.  They’re all right, so I let ’em go.  We can get ’em after they finish their routes.”

“Um,” assented Thong.  “Anything gone from the store?” he asked Darcy.

“I haven’t looked.”

“Better take a look around.  It’s probably a robbery.  You know the stock, don’t you?”

“As well as she did herself.  I’ve been doing the buying lately.”

“Well, have a look.  Who’s that at the door?” he asked sharply, for a knock as of authority sounded—­different from the aimless and impatient kickings and tappings of the wet throng outside.

“It’s Daley from the Times,” reported Mulligan, peering out.  “He’s all right.  Shall I let him in?”

“Oh, yes, I guess so,” assented Carroll, with a glance at Thong, who confirmed, by a nod of his head, what his partner said.  “He’ll give us what’s right.  Let him in.”

The reporter entered, nodded to the detectives, gave a short glance at the body, a longer one at Darcy, poked Mulligan in the ribs, lighted a cigarette, which he let hang from one lip where it gyrated in eccentric circles as he mumbled: 

“What’s the dope?”

“Don’t know yet,” answered Carroll.  “The old lady’s dead—­murdered it looks like—­and—­”

“What’s that?” interrupted Thong.  “What’s that ticking sound?”

“It’s the watch—­in her hand,” replied Darcy, and his voice was a hoarse whisper.

CHAPTER II

KING’S DAGGER

Carroll and Thong, proceeding along the lines they usually followed in cases like this, keeping to the rules which had come to them through the instructions of superior officers, and some which they had worked out for themselves, had, in a comparatively short time, ascertained the name, age and somewhat of the personal history of Mrs. Amelia Darcy, together with that of her cousin, as the detectives called him, though the relationship was not as close as that.