THE fact that Bede had put a seal on Fullerton's door indicated that the detective had not yet made the examination of the room which unquestionably it was his intention to make. That he should have deferred so important a matter for twenty-four hours could only be explained on the theory that he had some still more important project on hand which was occupying his personal attention.

Lyon intended to get into Fullerton's rooms if possible before Bede did, but the plan which he had hastily formed at the Wellington required the cover of darkness. He could do nothing along that line before night, and in the meantime he felt that he could do nothing more interesting (and possibly important) than to discover what Bede was engaged upon that was so engrossing as to make him postpone the investigation of Fullerton's rooms to another day.

Lyon figured it out like this: Bede had received from Hunt (and undoubtedly had opened and read) a letter from Fullerton addressed to Miss Wolcott. He already knew (as had appeared at their first interview) that Fullerton had at one time been engaged to Miss Wolcott. Therefore the association of her name with his was not a new idea. Yet he had been "shadowing" her yesterday afternoon. Presumably, therefore, he had suddenly come to perceive a new importance in her movements. Was his watchfulness over her the occasion of his present preoccupation? Lyon would have given much for a clairvoyant vision to tell him where Bede was at that moment. Being obliged to trust instead to his reasoning powers, he went to Hemlock Avenue, and walked past Miss Wolcott's house. The house wore its customary air of seclusion and there was no lounger in the street. He walked a block farther, and went into a drug store, where, as he happened to know, there was a public telephone and a gossiping clerk.

"Has Bede been here to-day?" he asked, carelessly.

"Bede who?"

"Don't you know Bede, the detective?--little gray man with keen eyes and a voice that he keeps behind his teeth. I expected to find him here."

"He was here this morning,--or a man like him," said the clerk. "A detective, you say. Gee!"

"What's up?"

The clerk was looking rather startled. "Well, if I had known he was a detective! He gave out that he was the credit-man for the new furniture store around the corner, and asked about several people in the neighborhood that we have accounts with. Our old man has some stock in the furniture concern, so I gave him all the information I could."

"What accounts did he ask about? Do you remember?"

The clerk named half a dozen. Lyon was not surprised to hear Miss Wolcott's among them. He was both surprised and startled to hear Miss Elliott's.

"What did you tell him about these two?" he asked thoughtfully.

"I let him see their accounts in the ledger."

"I wish you'd let me see those same accounts."

The clerk demurred and Lyon, who had noticed a college fraternity pin in the other's scarf, opened his coat. He wore the same pin.

"Oh, all right," said the easy-going clerk, with a laugh. "If I'm going to be fired for giving anything away to a detective, I'll have the satisfaction of helping a Nota Bena anyhow. Here are the account books. Come around here."

He opened a page with Miss Edith Wolcott's name at the top. The latest entry caught Lyon's eye at once.

"Nov. 25, Sulphonal, 6gr., .45."

The date was the date of Fullerton's murder. Lyon pointed to the entry.

"Could you tell me what time of the day that sale was made?"

"That's exactly what the other man asked," the clerk exclaimed, in amaze.

"And you told him--?"

"It was half past nine in the evening. I happened to remember because I leave at half past nine every evening and the night clerk comes on, and just as I was going out Miss Wolcott came in and asked if I could give her something to make her sleep. She said she was too nervous to sleep, and I noticed she seemed all of a tremble. Her hands were shaking when she took the packet."

"Did you tell Bede all that?"

"I guess I did."

"Did he ask you any other questions?"

"Not about Miss Wolcott. He looked a long time at Miss Elliott's account."

"Let me see it, then."

The clerk turned the pages.

"We charge everything that is prescribed for anyone at the school to Miss Elliott's account, and show on our bill who it was for," said the clerk. "That's what these names mean." He pointed to the names "Miss Jones," "Miss Beatly," etc., opposite each item. Lyon was distinctly startled to catch the name "Miss Tayntor" at frequent intervals.

"Has she been ill?" he asked with quick concern, and then added lamely, "She's a--sort of cousin of mine."

The clerk grinned.

"Gunther's chocolates."

"Oh!"

Lyon studied the entries assiduously for the next few moments. Among the latest were a number of charges, "for Mrs. W. B." Had that meant anything to Bede?

"Did Bede ask about any of them in particular?" he inquired by way of answering his own query.

"He wanted to know who Mrs. W. B. was."

"What did you tell him?"

"Told him they were Dr. Barry's prescriptions. They were marked that way. That's all I know."

"Remember anything else he asked about?"

"No. That's about all."

Lyon went into the telephone booth and called up Dr. Barry.

"Hello, Barry. This is Lyon. I want to know how Mrs. W. B. is getting along."

"Now see here, Lyon, don't you think you are crowding things a little? There really hasn't been time for any radical change since noon."

"What do you mean?"

"I told you at noon that she was not to be disturbed for several days yet."

"Told me?"

"Well, I told the boy who telephoned for you."

"I have not authorized anyone to telephone for me.

"What? Why, someone telephoned in your name, and you have been such a nuisance about the case that I thought of course it was you again."

"Did you happen to mention the lady's name, or only her initials?" asked Lyon.

Barry hesitated so long in answering that Lyon could only draw the most serious conclusion.

"I can't say," Barry answered, with some constraint.

"It's important I should know, Barry. You know she was very desirous of keeping her visit here unknown, and if you have been giving it away, I must at least know the facts, so as to head off trouble if possible." He threw all his earnestness into his voice and Barry yielded a reluctant reply, saying,

"It is possible that I did. I thought it was your message."

"Did he ask anything else in particular?"

"No. Excuse me, I'm very busy." And the 'phone shut off.

Lyon walked out and back up Hemlock Avenue. He was breathing quickly as though he had been running.

"If I were Bede I think I should be rather proud of myself, making two such hauls as that in one morning. At this rate, Bede will soon know all that I know myself and a little more," he said to himself. "Is it possible that he will attach any significance to Miss Wolcott's purchase of a soporific on the fatal 25th? Good Lord, I wish she had stayed at home that evening! That visit to the druggist at half-past nine brings her very close to the scene of the murder. Did she go for a sleeping powder before or after the murder? Is it possible after all--" He shook his head impatiently at his own suggestion.

"At any rate, I must let Howell know at once that Bede has discovered Mrs. Broughton. Something will come from that, and soon. I suspect we'll have to defy dear Dr. Barry. He deserves the limit of the law."

He was within half a block of Olden's. He determined to go there to telephone. It was the nearest place and incidentally it would enable him to get Kittie's latest report on Mrs. Broughton's condition.

As he entered the hall. Olden met him,--if indeed this wild-eyed man, whose goggles lay crushed on the floor and whose white wig sat askew upon his own black hair, could be the sedate and decorous Olden. He fairly hurled himself at Lyon, crushing his arm with an iron grasp.

"The curtain is down,--have you seen? What does it mean? Where is she? Has she gone away? Can't you speak? What do you know about it? Where has she gone?" His questions piled one upon another unintelligibly.

"What in the world do you mean?" gasped Lyon. "The curtain--" He tore himself away and rushed upstairs to his window.............