Even before Kennedy announced where he was going, I outguessed the next step in his scheme.

He would end by planting something that would make Honora fearful for Shattuck, as well as for herself. The effect would be to bring to light her suppressed desires, to make the Freudian theory play detective for us. And then? Almost anything might happen.

Looked at in this light, I could see that Craig would have done a very profitable day\'s work. It was, in short, merely playing one against the other—first Lathrop against Vina; now Honora against Shattuck.

We rode back again up-town and prepared to make our daily excuse for visiting Mrs. Wilford. In spite of the distastefulness of our duty, I felt sure that still our position with her was superior to that of the other inquisitors who were always on her trail.

"Before we go in," cautioned Kennedy, as we entered the main entrance to the apartment, "I want to see McCabe. He must be back on the job by this time."
[248]

Careful to cover ourselves, we sought out the ostensibly empty apartment which Doyle had hired as a dictagraph room. McCabe was there and seemed to be glad to see us. Evidently he had some news to report.

"What\'s on your mind, McCabe?" greeted Kennedy.

"Why, sir, he\'s been calling her up again."

"Who?"

"Mr. Shattuck, I mean."

Kennedy merely glanced at me. The virus had begun to work.

"What did he say?" asked Kennedy, quickly.

"I couldn\'t just make out what it was about. He wasn\'t very definite. Said he wanted to see her alone."

"And Mrs. Wilford?"

"Said she couldn\'t—that she was afraid—afraid for him, she said. I guess she knows pretty well how we\'re watching her."

"What did Shattuck say to that?"

"Well, I should say he was trying to warn her," replied McCabe, "without coming out too definitely. You see, they were both pretty careful in the words they used. There\'s something strange between that pair, you can be sure of that."

"What were the exact words?" asked Kennedy. "Did you get them down?"

McCabe nodded and referred to his notes.

"When Mr. Shattuck called up, he asked her first, \'I suppose they\'re watching you yet, Honora?\'
[249]

"\'Oh, Vance,\' she answered, \'it gets worse every day.\'

"There\'s some more—and then he suddenly said, \'Honora, Kennedy has just been here to see me again.\'

"She seemed to be rather alarmed at that news. \'To see you again, Vance? What about?\'

"\'I don\'t know what he\'s up to,\' Shattuck replied. \'I wish I did. It\'s something about that poisoned bean—you know, the thing they\'ve been talking about.\'"

"Pretending ignorance!" I exclaimed. "He knows. Go on."

"They talked about that a little while, without saying anything important. The next was Honora: \'He keeps asking me all sorts of questions about dreams and trying psychological experiments. I don\'t dare refuse to answer. But what do you suppose it is all about, Vance?\'"

"What did Shattuck tell her?" asked Kennedy, interested.

"Here, I\'ll read it, exactly. \'More of that Freud stuff, I guess, Honora, from what you\'ve already told me. That may go all very well in a book—or in Greenwich Village. But it\'s a fake, I tell you. Don\'t believe it—too much.\'"

"That\'s a remarkably reassuring statement," commented Kennedy. "Don\'t believe it—and then he takes it all back by adding, \'too much.\'"

"Yes, sir," agreed McCabe, to whom this angle of the case was a mystery. "I don\'t know as he believed [250] what he said himself. You see, he next asked her: \'Can\'t you see me? I must try to help you.\' And he meant it, too."

"Did she say she would?" hastened Kennedy.

"Not directly. \'Vance, I\'m so afraid—afraid to drag you into this thing. You know they\'re watching me so closely. I don\'t see them around—yet they seem to know so much.\'"

"You don\'t suppose she suspects anything of this?" I interrupted, indicating the dictagraph and the tapped telephone.

"Hardly," answered McCabe. "She wouldn\'t talk at all over the wire, if she did, would she? Here\'s how it ended. Shattuck said, finally, \'Well, I\'m going to see you very soon, anyhow, to have a heart-to-heart talk, Honora.\' He seemed to be quite worried. And so did she over him."

"Have you told Doyle anything about it?" asked Craig.

"Haven\'t had a chance yet. It just happened."

Kennedy turned to go.

"Oh, just before that that detective called her up, too."

"Which one—Rascon or Chase?"

"Chase."

Kennedy smiled quietly. Everything was working.

"What of him?"

"He said you had been to see him. There was something about that poisonous bean he told her."
[251]

"Did he mention Shattuck\'s name?" asked Kennedy.

"Yes, he questioned her about Shattuck—about his travels—I thought it was pretty broadly hinting after he mentioned that Calabar bean."

"But did he say anything definite about it? I mean, anything connecting it with Shattuck?"

"No—nothing definite."

Evidently Chase had never told Honora of his discovery in Shattuck\'s apartments. Why? Was it because he was sure that she would not believe it? Was he waiting for more conclusive evidence? What was the reason? It had not been revealed even yet.

We thanked McCabe, made our exit, and arrived on Honora\'s floor in such a way that it would not be suspected that we had been anywhere else in the building.

As we met Mrs. Wilford, I cannot say that we were quite as welcome as on some previous encounters with her. It seemed that she was repressing her excitement not quite as easily as on previous occasions.

Yet she seemed not to dare to refuse to see us. Perhaps, too, there was an element of curiosity to know whether anything had been discovered beyond what Doyle had already told her.

If that were the case, she had not long to wait. Kennedy did not plan this time to keep her in suspense long.

In fact, it seemed as if it were part of his plan [252] to fire the information he wished to impart as a broadside and watch the effect, both immediate and ultimate.

"I suppose you have read in the newspapers about the troubles of the Lathrops and what has happened?" he opened fire.

"Nothing about that woman interests me," Honora returned, coldly.

"That\'s not exactly what I came to tell you, though," remarked Kennedy, briskly.

Honora was on the alert in an instant, although she tried to hide it.

"I\'ve discovered just what it was that caused the death of your husband," hastened Craig.

I watched her closely. She was trying to show just enough and not too much interest.

"Indeed?" she replied, veiling her eyes as a matter of self-defense. "Was it belladonna?"

"No, it was not atropin," returned Craig, giving the drug its more scientific name. "It was physostigmine."

I was watching her narrowly. Evidently she had been expecting some repetition of the psychological tests and Kennedy\'s more direct attack almost swept away a defense as she tried to adjust herself to the unexpected.

Before she could recover from the shock that the bald statement seemed to give her, Craig shot out, "Has Doyle told you?"

"Yes," she replied, endeavoring to remain calm and at the same time appear frank, "something [253] about a bean which either you or Mr. Jameson discovered down in the office."

"Then why did you mention belladonna?" asked Craig.

She avoided his gaze as she answered, quickly, "Because it was the first thing that the police mentioned—the first thing that came into my head—like some of your psychological tests, I suppose."

The last sentence was uttered with a sort of sarcastic defiance which I did not relish in Honora.

"So," she continued in the same defiant tone, "it\'s another poison, this time—this physostigmine?"

"Yes," reiterated Kennedy, quietly. "The Calabar bean. I suppose Doyle described it to you—its devilish uses in the Calabar—the way the natives use it in ordeals—and all that sort of thing?"

"Yes—briefly," she replied, evidently steeling herself into a nonchalance she did not feel.

"Of course, the drug has a certain medical importance, too," continued Craig, as though eager to hammer home the information about it which he wished to have stick in her mind. "It is physostigmine."

Honora was evidently about to ask some............