I am sure she knew we had wanted something, and that she had failed
to give it to us, for when she came out she was depressed and in a
state of lowered vitality.

"I'm afraid I'm not helping you," she said. "I'm a little tired,
I think."

She was tired. I felt suddenly very sorry for her. She was so
pretty and so young--only twenty-six or thereabouts--to be in the
grip of forces so relentless. Sperry sent her home in his car, and
took to pacing the floor of his office.

"I'm going to give it up, Horace," he said. "Perhaps you are right.
We may be on the verge of some real discovery. But while I'm
interested, so interested that it interferes with my work, I'm
frankly afraid to go on. There are several reasons."

I argued with him. There could be no question that if things were
left as they were, a number of people would go through life convinced
that Elinor Wells had murdered her husband. Look at the situation.
She had sent out all the servants and the governess, surely an
unusual thing in an establishment of that sort. And Miss Jeremy
had been vindicated in three points; some stains had certainly been
washed up, we had found the key where she had stated it to be, and
Arthur had certainly been shaving himself.

"In other words," I argued, "we can't stop, Sperry. You can't stop.
But my idea would be that our investigations be purely scientific
and not criminal."