“Who is the young woman standing outside there, the only one in the yard?”

Mr. Sutherland, moving rapidly to the window, drew aside the shade.

“It is Miss Page, my housekeeper’s niece,” he explained.  “I do not understand her interest in this affair.  She followed me here from the house and could hardly be got to leave this room, into which she intruded herself against my express command.”

“But look at her attitude!” It was Mr. Fenton who spoke.  “She’s crazier than Philemon, it seems to me.”

There was some reason for this remark.  Guarded by the high fence from the gaze of the pushing crowd without, she stood upright and immovable in the middle of the yard, like one on watch.  The hood, which she had dropped from her head when she thought her eyes and smile might be of use to her in the furtherance of her plans, had been drawn over it again, so that she looked more like a statue in grey than a living, breathing woman.  Yet there was menace in her attitude and a purpose in the solitary stand she took in that circle of board-girded grass, which caused a thrill in the breasts of those who looked at her from that chamber of death.

“A mysterious young woman,” muttered the minister.

“And one that I neither countenance nor under-stand,” interpolated Mr. Sutherland.  “I have just shown my displeasure at her actions by dismissing her from my house.”

The coroner gave him a quick look, seemed about to speak, but changed his mind and turned toward the dead woman.

“We have a sad duty before us,” said he.

The investigations which followed elicited one or two new facts.  First, that all the doors of the house were found unlocked; and, secondly, that the constable had been among the first to enter, so that he could vouch that no disarrangement had been made in the rooms, with the exception of Batsy’s removal to the bed.

Then, his attention being drawn to the dead woman, he discovered the key in her tightly closed hand.

“Where does this key belong?” he asked.

They showed him the drawers in the cupboard.

“One is empty,” remarked Mi.  Sutherland.  “If the other is found to be in the same condition, then her money has been taken.  That key she holds should open both these drawers.”

“Then let it be made use of at once.  It is important that we should know whether theft has been committed here as well as murder.”  And drawing the key out, he handed it to Mr. Fenton.

The constable immediately unlocked the drawer and brought it and its contents to the table.

“No money here,” said he.

“But papers as good as money,” announced the doctor.  “See! here are deeds and more than one valuable bond.  I judge she was a richer woman than any of us knew.”

Mr. Sutherland, meantime, was looking with an air of disappointment into the now empty drawer.

“Just as I feared,” said he.  “She has been robbed of her ready money.  It was doubtless in the other drawer.”