"Dead!" said he.
"As a stone," said Anthony.
"And no one was about—the shutters were up, and the door was standing open?"
"Yes."
The little old apothecary stared with round eyes.
"I knew Mr. Magruder," said he. "At odd times he'd come here for a pennyworth of dragon-root, which he used for an asthma. A close man; he spent little and said less. He so seldom mixed with people that I'd have ventured he'd not a friend, nor an enemy, anywhere. What manner of blow killed him?"
"I did not look narrowly," said the young man, "but it seemed in the nature of a stab."
"There are some desperate rogues going about," said Christopher, shaking his head. "Desperate, and cunning, too. Did you speak with the watch after you gave the alarm?"
"I gave no alarm," said Anthony. Then he told of how Magruder had written him at New Orleans, of his interview with him on the day before, of his talk with Dr. King, and of his visitor at the Half Moon in the small hours of the morning.
"God bless us!" said Christopher Dent, his eyes wider than before. "What can it all mean?"