"I can't
remember." He passed a hand weakly over his forehead.
"What a night!" sighed Miss Cornelia, sinking into a chair.
"Richard Fleming murdered in this house--and now--this!"
The Unknown shot her a stealthy glance from beneath lowered eyelids.
But when she looked at him, his face was blank again.
"Why doesn't somebody ask his name?" queried Dale, and, "Where the
devil is that detective?" muttered Beresford, almost in the same
instant.
Neither question was answered, and Beresford, increasingly uneasy
at the continued absence of Anderson, turned toward the hall.
The Doctor took Dale's suggestion.
"What's your name?"
Silence from the Unknown--and that blank stare of stupefaction.
"Look at his papers." It was Miss Cornelia's voice. The Doctor
and Bailey searched the torn trouser pockets, the pockets of the
muddied shirt, while the Unknown submitted passively, not seeming
to care what happened to him. But search him as they would--it
was in vain.
"Not a paper on him," said Jack Bailey at last, straightening up.
A crash of breaking glass from the head of the alcove stairs put a
period to his sentence. All turned toward the stairs--or all
except the Unknown, who, for a moment, half-rose in his chair, his
eyes gleaming, his face alert, the mask of bewildered apathy gone
from his face.
As they watched, a rigid little figure of horror backed slowly down
the alcove stairs and into the room--Billy, the Japanese, his
Oriental placidity disturbed at last, incomprehensible terror
written in every line of his face.
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