(d) The governess had come in at just after the death.  Mr. Horace Johnson had had a talk with her.  She had left the front door unfastened when she went out at eight o’clock.  She said she had gone out to telephone about another position, as she was dissatisfied.  She had phoned from, Elliott’s pharmacy on State Avenue.  Later that night Mr. Johnson had gone to Elliott’s.  She had lied about the message.  She had really telephoned to a number which the pharmacy clerk had already discovered was that of the Ellingham house.  The message was that Mr. Ellingham was not to come, as Mr. and Mrs. Wells were going out.  It was not the first time she had telephoned to that number.

There was a stir in the room.  Something which we had tacitly avoided had come suddenly into the open.  Sperry raised his hand.

“It is necessary to be explicit,” he said, “that the Club may see where it stands.  It is, of course, not necessary to remind ourselves that this evening’s disclosures are of the most secret nature.  I urge that the Club jump to no hasty conclusions, and that there shall be no interruptions until we have finished with our records.”

(e) At a private seance, which Mr. Johnson and I decided was excusable under the circumstances, the medium was unable to give us anything.  This in spite of the fact that we had taken with us a walking-stick belonging to the dead man.

(f) The second sitting of the Club.  I need only refresh your minds as to one or two things; the medium spoke of a lost pocketbook, and of letters.  While the point is at least capable of doubt, apparently the letters were in the pocketbook.  Also, she said that a curtain would have been better, that Hawkins was a nuisance, and that everything was all right unless the bullet had made a hole in the floor above.  You will also recall the mention of a box of cartridges in a table drawer in Arthur Wells’s room.

“I will now ask Mr. Horace Johnson to tell what occurred on the night before last, Thursday evening.”

“I do not think Horace has a very clear recollection of last Thursday night,” my wife said, coldly.  “And I wish to go on record at once that if he claims that spirits broke his hat, stole his overcoat, bumped his head and sent him home with a pair of fire-tongs for a walking-stick, I don’t believe him.”

Which attitude Herbert, I regret to say, did not help when he said: 

“Don’t worry, Horace will soon be too old for the gay life.  Remember your arteries, Horace.”

I have quoted this interruption to show how little, outside of Sperry, Mrs. Dane and myself, the Neighborhood Club appreciated the seriousness of the situation.  Herbert, for instance, had been greatly amused when Sperry spoke of my finding the razorstrop and had almost chuckled over our investigation of the ceiling.

But they were very serious when I had finished my statement.

“Great Scott!” Herbert said.  “Then she was right, after all!  I say, I guess I’ve been no end of an ass.”