to walk across the floor just then he would have strutted. I
smiled because I wanted Kennedy to show again his marvelous skill
in tracing a crime to its perpetrator. I was anxious that nothing
should be done to hamper him.




II

THE TINY SCRATCH


Kennedy, before his own examination of the body, turned to Doctor
Blake. "Tell me just what you found when you arrived," he
directed.

The physician, whose practice embraced most of the wealthy
families in and around Tarrytown, was an unusually tall, iron-
gray-haired man of evident competency. It was very plain that he
resented his unavoidable connection with the case.

"She was still alive," he responded, thoughtfully, "although
breathing with difficulty. Nearly everyone had clustered about
her, so that she was getting little air, and the room was stuffy
from the lights they had been using in taking the scene. They
told me she dropped unconscious and that they couldn't revive
her, but at first it did not occur to me that it might be
serious. I thought perhaps the heat--"