"I am here," he muttered, "I have killed her, or, at least, she is dying—lying there on the floor, dying—I have to get out before the servants break in—I can't get out, there's no way I can get out. Mr. Stone, he didn't get out, because——"

"Because he wasn't in!" interrupted Fleming Stone, excitedly. "Oh, Fibs, do you see it that way too?"

"Sure I do! Fancy anybody untyin' a lot o' ropes, and freein' the lady and makin' a getaway, ropes and all, in two or three minutes, and besides, he couldn't get out!"

Fibsy stated this as triumphantly as if it were a new proposition. "The upset table," he went on, "the smashed lamp, with its long, green cord, the poor lady's dress open at the throat——"

"Yes," Stone nodded, eagerly, "yes,—and I daresay she had lace frills at her wrists and neck——"

"Of course she did! Oh, the plucky one!"

And then the two investigators put their heads together and reconstructed to their own satisfaction the whole scene of Mrs. Pell's tragic death.

"I'll go right over to see Young again," Stone said, at last, "and you skip around to see Mrs. Bowen; she'll tell you more than Miss Clyde can."

"Of course she will, and the dominie, too."

After a long argument, Fleming Stone persuaded Young that it would really be better for him to tell the truth, as to his movements on that fatal Sunday, than to persist in his falsehoods.

Stone did not tell the prisoner of his brother's confirmation of his unimpeachable alibi, but he told him that he was sure he did not murder Mrs. Pell.

"However," Stone said, "unless you tell the truth about her death, you will not only be suspected but convicted." And, finally, seeing it was his best hope, Young told his story.

"I went to the house about half-past eleven Sunday morning," he stated, "everybody had gone to church, and the old lady was there alone."

"What did you go for?"

"To get that receipt and the pin."

"Why those two things?"

"I had reason to think that they meant the discovery of her great hoard of jewels. I'm telling you all, for I want to prove that I not only did not kill the lady, but had no thought or intention of doing so."

"You took ropes along to tie her with?"

"Hardly that. I had some strong twine, as I thought she might prove fractious, and I was determined to get the pin and paper."

"How did you ever know about those things?"

"My uncle made the pin—engraved it, I mean. He was a marvelously expert engraver in the firm of Craig, Marsden & Co. After his death I came across a memorandum that gave away the secret. Not the solution of the cipher, exactly, he didn't know that himself. But a statement that he had engraved the pin for Mrs. Pell, and that, with the receipt for the work itself, it formed a direction as to where the jewels were hidden."

"And you demanded these things of her?"

"Yes, I told her the jewels belonged partly to my uncle."

"Did they?"

"No; not exactly, though Mrs. Pell had promised him some small stones, and I'm not sure she gave them to him."

"Go on, tell it all."

"I'm willing to, for my game is up, and I want to get away from a murder charge! My heavens, I'd never think of killing anybody!"

"Wait a minute, you say you reached the house about eleven-thirty. How did you come?"

"I was in my little car. I left that in the woodland road."

"And that's when Sam saw you."

"I suppose so. I didn't see him."

"Did you see Bannard?"

"I did. He was coming away from the house as I started toward it."

"He didn't see you?"

"No, I took good care of that."

"Then he did go away at nearly noon, and he was on his way down to New York when he stopped at the Red Fox Inn."

"Yes, his story is all true. I fixed up the Inn people to put it the other way, because I feared for my own skin."

"You are a fine specimen! Well, go on."

"Well, I was bound to get that pin. I asked Mrs. Pell for it, and she laughed. She wasn't a bit afraid of me. Plucky old thing! I had to tie her while I hunted around! She was ready to scratch my eyes out!"

"And you beat her—bruised her!"

"No more than I had to. She struggled like a wildcat."

"And you upset the table in your scrap?"

"We did not! Nor smash the lamp. Nor did I dash her to the floor. I'm telling you the exact truth, because there's so much seeming evidence against me that I'm playing safe. I searched all the room, and I found the paper, but I couldn't find the pin."

"You cut out her pocket?"

"I did, but I didn't tear open her gown at the throat, nor did I fling her to the floor to kill her on the fender. I finally untied her and went away, leaving her practically unharmed, save for a few bruises. Why, man, she was at dinner after that, with guests present."

"And where were you?"

"I went right over to my brother's—I suppose you won't believe this, you'll think he's standing by me to save my life—but it's true. I reached Joe's by half-past twelve, and I staid there till four or so. There was nobody more surprised than I to hear of Mrs. Pell's murder! I left that woman alive and well. The slight bruises were nothing, as is proved by her presence at the dinner table."

"I can't see why she didn't tell of your visit."

"She was a very peculiar woman. And she had it in for me! I think she felt that she could get me and punish me with more surety by biding her time till she could see her lawyer, or somebody like that. It seems to me in keeping with her peculiar disposition that she kept my attack on her a secret, until she chose to reveal it!"

"Mr. Young, I wouldn't believe this strange story of yours, but for your brother's statements and my absolute conviction of your brother's honesty. Both he and his wife tell a staightforward tale of your arrival and departure on that Sunday, which exactly coincides with your own. And there is other corroboration. Now, you are held here, as you know, for other reasons; kidnapping is a crime, and not a slight one, either."

"I know it, Mr. Stone, and I'll take my punishment for that, but I'm not guilty of murder. I was possessed to get hold of that pin. I planned clever schemes to get it, but they all went awry, and I became desperate. So, when I found a chance, I took it. I did Miss Clyde no real harm, and I was willing to go halves with her. The day I had two friends take her to my brother's house, he being away for the day, she was in no danger, and at but slight inconvenience. Flossie, as Miss Clyde will tell you herself, was neither rude nor ungracious."

"Never mind all that, now, give me the receipt."

Young hesitated, but a warning scowl from Stone persuaded him, and with a sigh he handed over what was without doubt the receipt in question.

"This is Winston Bannard's property," said the detective, "and you do well to give it up."

There was much to be done, but Fleming Stone was unable to resist the temptation to go home at once and work out the cryptogram, if possible, by the aid of the receipt.

The paper itself was merely a bill for the engraving on the pin. The price charged was five hundred dollars, and the bill was receipted by J.S. Ferrall, who, Young had said, was the man who did the engraving.

There were various words on the bill, both printed and written. Working with feverish intensity, Stone tried them one by one, and when he used the word Ferrall as a keyword, he found he had at last succeeded in his undertaking.

Beginning thus:

he pursued his course by finding F in his top alphabet line. Running downward until he struck O, he noted that was in the cross line beginning with J. J, therefore was the first letter of the message. Next he found E at the top, and traced that line down to I, which gave him E for his second letter. Going on thus, he soon had the full message, which read:

"Jewels all between L and M. Seek and ye shall find."

This solved the cipher, but was far from being definite information.

In a conclave, all agreed that the message was as bewildering as the cipher itself.

Mr. Chapin could give no hint as to what was meant. Neither Iris nor Lucille Darrel could imagine what L and M stood for.

"Seems like a filing cabinet or card catalogue," suggested Stone, but Iris said her aunt had not owned such a thing.

"Well, we'll find them," Stone promised, "having this information, we'll somehow puzzle out the rest."

"Look in the dictionary or encyclopedia," put in Fibsy, who was scowling darkly in his efforts to think it out.

"You can't hide a lot of jewels in a book!" exclaimed Lucille.

"No; but there might be a paper there telling more."

However, no amount of search brought forth anything of the sort, and they all thought again.

"When were these old things hidden?" Fibsy asked suddenly.

"The receipt is dated ten years ago," said Stone, "of course that doesn't prove——"

"Where'd she live then?"

"Here," replied Iris. "But I've sometimes imagined that she took her jewels back to her old home in Maine to hide them. Hints she dropped now and then gave me that impression."

"Whereabouts in Maine?"

"In a village called Greendale."

"Her folks all live there?"

"I think her parents did——"

"What are their names? Did they begin with L or M?"

"No; both with E. They were Elmer and Emily, I think."

"Whoop! Whoop!" Fibsy sprang up in his excitement, and waved his arms triumphantly. "That's it! L and M means El and Em! Elmer and Emily!"

"Absurd!" scoffed Lucille, but Iris said, "You're right! Terence, you are right! That would be exactly like Aunt Ursula! And the jewels are buried between their two graves in the old Greendale cemetery! I dimly remember some things Auntie said, or sort of hinted at, that would just prove that very thing!"

"It sounds probable," Stone agreed, and Mr. Chapin said it was in his mind, too, that Mrs. Pell had hinted at Maine as her hoarding place, though he had partially forgotten it.

"But this is merely surmise," Stone reminded them, "and while it may be the truth, yet is it not possible that investigation will only give us further directions or more puzzles to work out?"

"It is not only possible but very probable," said Mr. Chapin. "I know my late client's character well enough to think that she made the discovery of her hoard just as difficult as she could. It was a queer twist in her brain that impelled her to play these fantastic tricks. Moreover, I can't think she would trust that fortune in gems to the lonely and unprotected earth of a cemetery."

"That's just what she would do," Iris insisted. "And really, what could be a safer hiding-place? Who would dream of digging between two old graves unless instructed to do so? And who could know of these secret and hidden instructions?"

"That's all so, Miss Clyde," Stone agreed with her. "I think it a marvellously well chosen place of concealment, and I am inclined to think the jewels themselves are there. But it may not be so. It may be we have further to look, more ciphers to solve. But, at least we are making progress. Now, who will make a trip to Maine?"

"Not I!" and Iris shook her head. "I care for the fortune, of course, but it is nothing to me beside the freedom of Mr. Bannard. I hope, Mr. Stone, that Charlie Young's confession of how he bruised and hurt poor Aunt Ursula proves Win's innocence and——"

"Not entirely, Miss Clyde. You see, we have his proof that Mr. Bannard left this house at half-past eleven, or just before Young arrived, but that won't satisfy the police that Mr. Bannard did not return at three o'clock or thereabouts."

"But he was on his way to New York then."

"So he says; but the courts insist on proof or testimony of a disinterested witness."

"But surely someone can be found who saw Win between the time he lunched at the inn, and the time he reached his rooms in New York."

"That's what we're hoping, but we haven't found that witness yet."

"Well, anyway," Iris pursued, "the people who saw him at the inn—at what time?"

"At about half-past twelve or so, I think."

"Well, their word proves that Win wasn't hidden here while we were at dinner, as some have suspected!"

"That's a good point, Miss Clyde! Now, if we can find a later witness——"

"But who did commit the murder?" asked Lucille. "You've put that Young out of the question, now, Lord knows I don't suspect Win Bannard, but who did do it?"

"And how did he get out?" added Fibsy, with the grim smile that often accompanied that unanswerable question.

"He must be found!" Iris exclaimed. "I told you at the outset, Mr. Stone, that I want to avenge Aunt Ursula's death as well as find the fortune she left."

"Even if suspicion clings to Mr. Bannard?"

"He didn't do it! All the suspicion in the world can't hurt him, because it isn't true! I shall free him, if necessary, by my own efforts! Truth must prevail. But more than that I want the murderer found. I want the mystery of his exit solved. I want to know the whole truth, and after that, we'll go to dig for the treasure. If no one knows of the meaning of the cipher message but just us few, no one else can get ahead of us, and dig before we get there. Please, please, Mr. Stone, let the jewels wait, and put all your energies toward solving the greater mystery of Aunt Ursula's death."

"A strong point in favor of Mr. Bannard," Stone said, thoughtfully, "is the fact of the clues that seemed to incriminate him. If he had been a murderer, would he have left the half-smoked cigarette, so easily traced to him? Would he have gone off with a check, drawn that very day, in his pocket?"

"And the paper! He left that!" exclaimed Lucille.

"No," said Stone, "he didn't leave that. Young left that."

"How do you know?"

"Because Young was staying at a boarding-house up in Harlem, and the New York paper, still unfolded, had in it a circular of a Harlem laundry. That's why I remarked to Terence that the man who left that came from near Bob Grady's place, which is a saloon near the laundry in question. That paper never came from the locality where Bannard lives."

"And that proved Mr. Young's presence," Fibsy said. "Just as the cigarette proved Mr. Bannard's. Now neither of those men would have left those clues if they had murdered the lady."

"I've always heard that a murderer does do just some such thoughtless thing," remarked Chapin.

"This murderer didn't," and Fibsy shook his head. "When you goin' to tell 'em, Mr. Stone?"

"Is Mrs. Bowen coming over?"

"Yes, sir, and here she comes now."

The minister's wife came hurrying into the room, and stared at the detective.

"You sent for me, Mr. Stone? I don't know anything—about——"

"Nothing that seems to you important, perhaps. But, please, answer a few simple questions. Did Mrs. Pell wear lace frills at her wrists and throat at dinner that Sunday you were here? I've asked Miss Clyde, and she can't remember."

"Yes, sir, she did. I recollect I had never seen her wearing such full and elaborate ones before."

"Did you notice anything else peculiar about her attire?"

"Only a spot of blood on the instep of her white stocking."

"Did you make any mention of it?"

"No; I thought at the time a mosquito had bitten her. But afterward I heard it remarked at the inquest that her ankles had been tied and cut by cords until they bled a little. I can't see how that could have happened before dinner."

"That's just when it did happen. I think, my friends, that I will now tell you what I am positive is the truth of this matter, though it will at first seem to you incredible. Will you let me reconstruct the whole day, as far as I can. Mrs. Pell was on her verandah, when her niece and her servants went to church. Soon after Winston Bannard came. They went into Mrs. Pell's sitting room, and she willingly gave her nephew a check for a large amount. Bannard went away, leaving behind a half-burned cigarette, but nothing else that we know of. Immediately came Charlie Young. He entered Mrs. Pell's sitting room, and found her there alone. The house doors were all open. He demanded the pin, and, he threatened her and finally he used rough treatment. He cut out her pocket in his desperate determination to secure the pin and the receipt, which later he found in the old pocket-book.

"He tied her in a chair, that he might better make undisturbed search, and finally went away, taking with him the cords with which he had bound her, the receipt and such moneys as he had found about the room, and leaving behind his New York paper. Then, left bruised and hurt, Mrs. Pell, instead of following the procedure of the usual woman, pulled herself together, and, angry and indignant, told no one of her awful experience, but attended the dinner table and entertained her guests as if nothing untoward had occurred. She did not change her gown but she added wrist frills to conceal her bruises, and she doubtless failed to notice the stain on her stocking.

"Then, after dinner, after the guests departed and Miss Clyde had gone to her own room, Mrs. Pell went into her sitting room, to rest and perhaps to plan vengeance on her assailant. But weak from shock, perhaps ill and dizzied, she stumbled over that long cord that is attached to the table lamp, upset lamp and table, and herself fell and hit her head on the fender. Doubtless she herself pulled open the neck of her gown as she gasped her last. She called out for help, and cried 'Thieves!' in a dazed remembrance of the attack that had been made on her by the thief. She locked the door, of course, when she first entered the room. I'm told that was her invariable custom of a Sunday afternoon. Then, after the poor lady screamed out with her dying breath, the servants came and were forced to break in the door to effect an entrance."

"That's it, all right, and it all checks up," said Fibsy, solemnly. "Cause why? Cause there ain't any other explanation that'll fit all the circumstances."

Nor was there. It did all check up. Further evidence was sought and found. Witnesses proved the truth of Bannard's declarations. Sam identified Young as the man he had seen prowling round in the woods that morning, and everything fitted in like the pieces of a picture puzzle.

There was no way for a murderer to escape from that locked room, because there was no murderer and had been no murder. Young's was not a murderous assault, though it was enough to earn him his well-deserved punishment, and the fact that the servants heard the crash of the overset table and lamp proved that it had not happened at the time of Young's visit.

No one had chanced to enter Mrs. Pell's sitting-room between the call of Young and the breaking in of the door, so the ransacked desk and the opened safe were not discovered.

What had been taken from the safe they never knew, for Young declared there was nothing in it, and they partially believed him.

But the jewels which were found buried between the graves of Ursula Pell's parents, Elmer and Emily Pell, were of sufficient value to make it a matter of little moment what was stolen from the safe.

And Winston Bannard was set free and came home in triumph to the smiling girl awaiting him.

Only Fleming Stone knew that Win Bannard had been so evasive and taciturn regarding himself because he feared that if he were freed Iris might be suspected.

He gave Iris the glory of bringing about his release, and though she disclaimed it, she whispered to him, "I said I would win for Win! The only thing that bothered me was that note seemingly in your writing, though disguised."

"I know," said Bannard, "and I knew somebody did that to make it seem like me, but I couldn't think who the villain could be."

"It was all a mighty close squeak," Fibsy said, thoughtfully. "I believe the keynote was struck when Sam told me he had dropped the 'pinny-pin in the colole! If he hadn't we never would have got anywhere!"

"We wouldn't have then," said Stone, generously, "if Fibsy hadn't grubbed in the 'colole' for the pinny-pin."

"And found it!" chimed in Bannard. "In recognition of which one Terence Maguire, Esquire, shall receive, shortly, one diamond pin!"

"Aw, shucks!" said Fibsy, greatly embarrassed at the praise heaped upon him; "but," he added, "I'd like it a heap!"

And he did.