Before Kennedy could answer there came a violent ring at the laboratory bell, and I hurried to the door.  It was one of the bell-boys from the hotel where the Barrioses had their apartment, with a message for Kennedy.

Craig tore it open and read it hurriedly.  “From Doctor Scott,” he said, briefly, in answer to my anxious query.  “Barrios is dead.”

Even though I had been prepared for the news by my last visit, death came as a shock, as it always does.  I had felt all along that Kennedy had been called in too late to do anything to save Barrios, but I had been hoping against hope.  But I knew that it was not too late to catch the criminal who had done the dastardly, heartless deed.  A few hours and perhaps all clues might have been covered up.  But there is always something that goes wrong with crime, always some point where murder cannot be covered up.  I think if people could only be got to realize it, as my experience both on the Star and with Kennedy have impressed it on me, murder would become a lost art.

Without another word Kennedy seized his hat and together we hurried to the hotel.

We found Anitra crying softly to herself, while near her sat Eulalie, tearless, stunned by the blow, broken-hearted.  In the realization of the tragedy everything had been forgotten, even the mysterious anonymous telegram signed, Judas-like, “A Friend.”

Sandoval, we learned, had been there when the end came, and had now gone out to make what arrangements were necessary.  I had nothing against the man, but I could not help feeling that, now that the business was all Anitra’s, might he not be the one to profit most by the death?  The fact was that Kennedy had expressed so little opinion on the case so far that I might be pardoned for suspecting any one—­even Teresa de Leon, who must have seen Jose slipping away from her in spite of her pursuit, whatever actuated it.

It was while I was in the midst of these fruitless speculations that Doctor Scott beckoned us outside, and we withdrew quietly.

“I don’t know that there is anything more that I can do,” he remarked, “but I promised Senor Sandoval that I would stay here until he came back.  He begged me to, seems scarcely to know how to do enough to comfort his sister and Senorita Barrios.”

I listened to the doctor keenly.  Was it possible that Sandoval had one of those Jekyll-Hyde natures which seem to be so common in some of us?  Had his better nature yielded to his worse?  To my mind that has often been an explanation of crime, never an adequate defense.

Kennedy was about to say something when the elevator door down the hall opened.  I expected that it was Sandoval returning, but it was Burton Page.

“They told me you were here,” he said, greeting us.  “I have been looking all over for you, down at your laboratory and at your apartment.  Would you mind stepping down around the bend in the hall?”