"Oh, Mr. Titheredge, I am so glad you have returned." She spoke with evident anxiety as she approached. "I hope you will be able to persuade Richard to let us get him into bed and nurse him. Did they tell you that besides his arm two ribs are fractured? He refuses absolutely—"
She, too, paused at sight of the strange young man kneeling upon the stairs, and her eyes turned inquiringly toward the attorney.
"Miss Meade," Titheredge's tone was very grave. "Will you permit me to present Sergeant Odell of the police department?"
She bowed with old-fashioned courtesy as the young man rose, but her face quivered slightly.
"I—I do not understand!" she said. "A policeman in this house! But why, Mr. Titheredge, why?"
"Because there have been things going on in this house that both Richard and the children desire to have investigated." The attorney spoke very gently. "We did not consult you at first because we did not want to distress you, but no time could be lost this morning. When the portrait—"
"Mr. Titheredge means," Odell interrupted hastily, "that the deaths of Mrs. Lorne and her son, taken in conjunction with the fall of the picture last night when your nephew was only saved by a miracle, and the broken stair this morning, which almost cost Mr. Lorne his life, may not have been accidents after all; and I have been engaged to investigate the latter two occurrences."
"But this is terrible!" Miss Meade cried in a low tone as if at a sacrilege. "My poor sister's death and Julian's were by the will of God! The—the others have been
