"Indeed, I don't," said Mrs. Wilcox hastily. "I think the whole affair is terrible and disgraceful enough on the face of it, and the sooner I get Miss Prudence Semaphore out of the house, the better. I must speak to Captain Wilcox at once. But then murder—. No, I can't believe it."
"Well, if you are going to risk allowing an infamous criminal to escape justice, a Cain whose hands are dyed in her sister's blood, I confess I am surprised at you."
"But think of the disgrace to the house," pleaded Mrs. Wilcox. "It will be put in the papers, and we shall be ruined, and you know, after all, Miss Lord, we are not quite sure. Miss Semaphore may be alive and well somewhere, and what fools we should look if we made a fuss, and then she turned up all right."
"She never will turn up," said the medical woman gloomily. "There never was a clearer case of circumstantial evidence. It doesn't take a Sherlock Holmes to piece it together."
"But what do you want me to do?"
"I think that as I have placed all the facts before you, your duty is to inform the police at once. You are the head of this house,
