"No, I encountered no one."

"Ah. Then--if you will excuse the remark--I do not quite see the
relevancy of the information."

"It has none. At present. I say it has none--at present."

He paused. Presently he resumed: "I did not encounter the assassin, but
I am on his track, I am sure, for I believe he is in this room. I will
ask you all to pass one by one in front of me--here, where there is a
good light--so that I can see your feet."

A buzz of excitement swept the place, and the march began, the guest
looking on with an iron attempt at gravity which was not an unqualified
success. Stillman stooped, shaded his eyes with his hand, and gazed down
intently at each pair of feet as it passed. Fifty men tramped
monotonously by--with no result. Sixty. Seventy. The thing was
beginning to look absurd. The guest remarked, with suave irony:

"Assassins appear to be scarce this evening."

The house saw the humor if it, and refreshed itself with a cordial laugh.
Ten or twelve more candidates tramped by--no, danced by, with airy and
ridiculous capers which convulsed the spectators--then suddenly Stillman
put out his hand and said:

"This is the assassin!"

"Fetlock Jones, by the great Sanhedrim!" roared the crowd; and at once
let fly a pyrotechnic explosion and dazzle and confusion of stirring