"The—the circumstances are a little peculiar," said the doctor. "Won't you sit down, Mr. Grimm? The fact is the young gentlemen of the party—it's an entertainment, private theatricals—were dining with me, and one of them was taken sick——"
"The feller upstairs, hey?" interposed Mr. Judd, smiling slightly.
"Ahem—yes. Well, then, Huddesley, who knew his part, volunteered to take his place in the play, you understand. It was a great accommodation——"
"Hold on a minute. Didn't it strike you as kinder queer he should 'a' been so well up in the stage-business? Fact is, he has been an actor, he's been pretty nearly everything, but you didn't know that of course. But didn't you ever have any suspicions?"
"Well, I had always thought the man was rather—rather unusual—a little above his station, perhaps. But this! It never occurred to me. You may have heard that there was an attempt at robbing the Pallinder residence this winter, and Huddesley was one of the first to discover it, and rouse the——"
He paused, seeing the two detectives exchange a meaning glance. "Told you so," said Judd. He got up, walked to the door, spat into the porch, and returned to his seat. "I was on—not right off, but pretty soon," said he. "Go ahead, Doc., you say Huddesley took your friend's part in the play——"
"I suppose he had seen these young men go through their parts a dozen times. It didn't seem at all odd to us; it would be a long story to go into all the details, but we—we found it most fortunate that he could supply the sick man's place. I wish to say, Mr. Grimm, that I have no cause, personally, to complain of Huddesley. His conduct since he has been with me has been most exemplary, I have never observed anything suspicious——"
The doctor came to a dead stand-still, for at that moment his discovery of the evening flashed into his mind with inconvenient abruptness.
"You're a kind-hearted man, sir," said Grimm, with warmth, "to say what you can for the fellow, but I've got his record. It's queer he ain't back yet." He looked at his watch. "They keep it up pretty late, don't they? It's after three." He got up briskly. "I guess we'd better leave Clancy here, Judd, an' go on up to the house. Looks to me like that'd ought to be our next move. All ready?" He stood a moment frowning over some new thought. "This here party, Doc., I guess it was goin' to be pretty swell, wasn't it? I mean ladies all diked out with diamond earrings an' breast-pins, hey?"