"Which was the room that Mr. Hardy occupied? Perhaps you'll let me see it."
"It ain't been swept or dusted recent," Mrs. Wilson informed him, rising to lead him from the room, "but you're welcome to see it, if you don't mind how it looks."
The apartment was a good-sized room, at the rear of the house. It was situated on a corner, with windows at the side and rear. Against the front partition an old-fashioned fireplace had been closed with a decorated cover. The neat bed, the hair-cloth chairs, and a table that stood on three of its four legs only, supplied the furnishings. The coroner had taken every scrap he could find of the few things possessed by Mr. Hardy.
"Nice, cheerful room," commented Garrison. "Did he keep the windows closed and locked?"
"Oh, no! He was a wonderful hand to want the air," said the landlady.
"And he loved the view."
The view of the shed and hen-coops at the rear was duly exhibited. Garrison did his best to formulate a theory to exonerate Dorothy from knowledge of the crime; but his mind had received a blow at these new disclosures, and nothing seemed to aid him in the least. He could only feel that some dark deed lay either at the door of the girl who had paid him to masquerade as her husband, or the half-crazed inventor down the street.
And the toils lay closer to Dorothy, he felt, than they did to Scott.
"You have been very helpful, I am sure," he said to Mrs. Wilson.
He bade her good-by and left the house, feeling thoroughly depressed in all his being.