suggested several things likely to be on the table. They were not
there, as you might have seen if you had had the picture before
you. That was a test of the susceptibility to suggestion of the
chef. Francois may not mean to lie, but I'm afraid we'll have to
get along without him in getting to the bottom of the case. You
see, before we go any further we know that he is unreliable--to
say the least. It may be that nothing at all happened in the
kitchen to the mushrooms. We'll never discover it from him. We
must get it elsewhere."

Miss Grey had been trying to straighten out some of the snarls
which Mansfield's business affairs had got into as a result of his
illness; but it was evident that she had difficulty in keeping her
mind on her work.

"The next thing I'd like to see," asked Kennedy, when we rejoined
her, "is that wall safe." She led the way down the hall and into
an ante-room to Mansfield's part of the suite. The safe itself was
a comparatively simple affair inside a closet. Indeed, I doubt
whether it had been seriously designed to be burglar-proof. Rather
it was merely a protection against fire.

"Have you any suspicion about when the robbery took place?" asked
Kennedy, as we peered into the empty compartment. "I wish I had
been called in the first thing when it was discovered. There might
have been some chance to discover fingerprints. But now, I
suppose, every clue of that sort has been obliterated."

"No," she replied; "I don't know whether it happened before or
after Mr. Mansfield was discovered so ill by his valet."