him out a bottle of soda-water which she should find there.

"Won't you try some?" he asked the lawyer, rising limply to his feet
when the beverage was brought, and drinking it with considerable noise.

"No, thank you," returned Mr. DIBBLE.

"As you please, then," said the organist, resignedly. "Only, if you have
a headache don't blame me. (Mr. and Mrs. SMYTHE, you may place a few
cloves where I can get them, and retire.) What you have told me, Mr.
DIBBLE, concerning the breaking of the engagement between your ward and
my nephew, relieves my mind of a load. As a right-thinking man, I can no
longer suspect you of having killed EDWIN DROOD."

"Suspect ME?" screamed the aged lawyer, almost leaping into the air.

"Calm yourself," observed Mr. BUMSTEAD, quietly, the while he ate a
sedative clove. "I say that I can _not_ longer suspect you. I can not
think that a person of your age would wantonly destroy a human life
merely to obtain an umbrella."

Absolutely purple in the face, Mr. DIBBLE snatched his hat from a chair
just as the Ritualistic organist was about to sit upon it, and was on
the point of hurrying wrathfully from the room, when the entrance of
Gospeler SIMPSON arrested him.

Noting his agitation, Mr. BUMSTEAD instantly resolved to clear him from
suspicion in the new-comer's mind also.

"Reverend Sir," he said to the Gospeler, quickly, "in this sad affair we