"Hume, according to the scrub-woman's story," resumed the big man, "was a queer kind of a chap. You didn't always know just how to take him. He's lapped up a good bit of booze first and last and sometimes he's come home pretty well settled. So when the woman sees the door open, this is the first thing that enters her mind. But to make sure, she goes into the room and calls him by name. The room's dark and there's just a touch of daylight coming in through the open door leading into the front room. So as there was no answer, she takes a peep in there and sees him on the floor."
"And is that all she can tell?"
"Yes; except that she bolted down the stairs in a hurry, met Paulson here," with a nod to the policeman, who had now discarded his cigar, "and told him what she had seen."
"What is her name and address?"
Osborne consulted a note book.
"Mrs. Dwyer, 71 Cormant Street," read he.
"Please make a note of that," said Stillman to his clerk. "And send for her later in the day." Then turning once more to Osborne, he continued. "Before doing anything else we will endeavor to find out how the criminal gained an entrance."
"That's the way with these Johnnie Newcomers," grumbled Osborne as Stillman turned once more to his aide. "They want to do it all. Why don't he go in, look at the body and leave the police business to the police."
"Too much earnestness may have its drawbacks," said Ashton-Kirk, "but it is to be preferred to the perfunctory methods of the accustomed official, for all."
"From your angle, maybe so," said Osborne with a frown; "but not from ours."