It may look very
different in a few hours. Come."
Pendleton gazed with sober eyes into the speaker's face for a moment.
Then he said:
"Let us get the cab; if you are to go over Hume's rooms before dark,
you haven't any too much time."
At the next corner they signaled a taxicab, and in a short time they
were set down in Christie Place. Paulson, the policeman, was standing
guard.
"How are you?" he greeted them affably.
"Been here all day?" asked Ashton-Kirk.
"Oh, no. Just come on. I'm the third shift since I saw you last."
"Nobody has been permitted to go upstairs, I presume?"
"Only the coroner's man, who came for the body. And they touched
nothing but the body. Our orders were strong on that."
"Has anything been heard as the result of the post-mortem?"
"It showed that Hume was in bad shape from too much drink. Then he had
a hard knock on the head, and the wound in his chest."
"But there was no sign of a bullet wound?"
"No," said Paulson, surprised. "Nothing like that."
"Just a moment," said the investigator to Pendleton. He crossed the
street, walked along for a few paces, then paused at the curb and
looked back toward Hume's doorway. Then he returned with quick steps
and an alert look in his eyes.
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