“The murderer of my brother shall be found and brought to justice!” declared Philip Crawford, and all present seemed to echo his vow.

Then and there, Mr. Crawford retained Lawyer Randolph to help him in running down the villain, and, turning to me, asked to engage my services also.

To this, I readily agreed, for I greatly desired to go on with the matter, and cared little whether I worked for an individual or for the State.

Of course Mr. Crawford’s determination to find the murderer proved anew his conviction that Florence Lloyd was above all suspicion, but in the face of certain details of the evidence so far, I could not feel so absolutely certain of this.

However, it was my business to follow up every clue, or apparent clue, and every bit of evidence, and this I made up my mind to do, regardless of consequences.

I confess it was difficult for me to feel regardless of consequences, for I had a haunting fear that the future was going to look dark for Florence Lloyd.  And if it should be proved that she was in any way responsible for or accessory to this crime, I knew I should wish I had had nothing to do with discovering that fact.  But back of this was an undefined but insistent conviction that the girl was innocent, and that I could prove it.  This may have been an inordinate faith in my own powers, or it may have been a hope born of my admiration for the young woman herself.  For there is no doubt, that for the first time in my life I was taking a serious interest in a woman’s personality.  Heretofore I had been a general admirer of womankind, and I had naturally treated them all with chivalry and respect.  But now I had met one whom I desired to treat in a far tenderer way, and to my chagrin I realized that I had no right to entertain such thoughts toward a girl already betrothed.

So I concluded to try my best to leave Florence Lloyd’s personality out of the question, to leave my feelings toward her out of the question, and to devote my energies to real work on the case and prove by intelligent effort that I could learn facts from evidence without resorting to the microscopic methods of Fleming Stone.  I purposely ignored the fact that I would have been only too glad to use these methods had I the power to do so!

IX

THE TWELFTH ROSE

For the next day or two the Crawford house presented the appearance usual in any home during the days immediately preceding a funeral.

By tacit consent, all reference to the violence of Mr. Crawford’s death was avoided, and a rigorous formality was the keynote of all the ceremonies.  The servants were garbed in correct mourning, the ladies of the house refused to see anybody, and all personal callers were met by Philip Crawford or his wife, while business acquaintances were received by Gregory Hall.

As private secretary, of course Mr. Hall was in full charge of Mr. Crawford’s papers and personal effects.  But, in addition to this, as the prospective husband of the heiress, he was practically the head of the house.