Driscoll came in.
“I’ve found out what killed Mr. Embury,” he said, in his quiet fashion.
“What?” cried the Examiner and Shane, at the same time.
“Can’t tell you—just yet. I’ll have to go out on an errand. Stay here—all of you—till I get back.”
The dapper little figure disappeared through the hall door, and Shane turned back to the group with a grunt of satisfaction.
“That’s Driscoll, all over,” he said. “Put him on a case, and he don’t say much, and he don’t look like he’s doing anything, and then all in a minute he’ll bring in the goods.”
“I’d be glad to hear the cause of that death,” said Dr. Crowell, musingly. “I’m an old, experienced practitioner, and I’ve never seen anything so mysterious. There’s absolutely no trace of any poison, and yet it can be nothing else.”
“Poison’s a mighty sly proposition,” observed Shane. “A clever poisoner can put over a big thing.”
“Perhaps your assumption of murder is premature,” said Hendricks, and he gave Shane a sharp look.
“Maybe,” and that worthy nodded his head. “But I’m still standing pat. Now, here’s the proposition. Three people, locked into a suite—you may say—of three rooms. No way of getting in from this side—those locks are heavy brass snap-catches that can’t be worked from outside. No way, either, of getting in at the windows. Tenth-story apartment, and the windows look straight down to the ground, no balconies or anything like that. Unless an aryoplane let off its passengers, nobody could get in the windows. Well, then, we have those three people shut up alone there all night. In the morning one of ‘em is dead—poisoned. What’s the answer?”