"The absence of the weapon is a strange factor in the case," put in Mr. Orville, apparently desirous of having his voice heard as well as those of the other jurors.
"Yes," agreed Mr. Monroe; "and yet it is not strange that the criminal carried away with him what might have been a proof of his identity."
"Does Miss Lloyd own a pistol?" blurted out Mr. Parmalee.
Gregory Hall gave him an indignant look, but Coroner Monroe seemed rather glad to have the question raised - probably so that it could be settle at once in the negative.
And it was.
"No," replied Mrs. Pierce, when the query was put to her. "Both Florence and I are desperately afraid of firearms. We wouldn't dream of owning a pistol - either of us."
Of course, this was significant, but in no way decisive.
Granting that Miss Lloyd could have been the criminal, it would have been possible for her secretly to procure a revolver, and secretly to dispose of it afterward. Then, too, a small revolver had been used. To be sure, this did not necessarily imply that a woman had used it, but, taken in connection with the bag and the rose petals, it gave food for thought.
But the coroner seemed to think Mrs. Pierce's assertions greatly in Miss Lloyd's favor, and, being at the end of his list of witnesses, he inquired if any one else in the room knew of anything that could throw light on the matter.
No one responded to this invitation, and the coroner then directed the jury to retire to find a verdict. The six men passed into another room, and I think no one who awaited their return apprehended any other result than the somewhat unsatisfactory one of "person or persons unknown."
And this was what the foreman announced when the jury returned after their short collocation.
Then, as a jury, they were dismissed, but from that moment the mystery of Joseph Crawford's death became the absorbing thought of all West Sedgwick.
"The murderer of my brother shall be found and brought to justice!" declared Philip Crawford, and all present seemed to echo his vow.
Then and there, Mr. Crawford retained Lawyer Randolph to help him in running down the villain, and, turning to me, asked to engage my services also.
To this, I readily agreed, for I greatly desired to go on with the matter, and cared little whether I worked for an individual or for the State.
Of course Mr. Crawford's determination to find the murderer proved anew his conviction that Florence Lloyd was above all suspicion, but in the face of certain details of the evidence so far, I could not feel so absolutely certain of this.
However, it was my business to follow up every clue, or apparent clue, and every bit of evidence, and this I made up my mind to do, regardless of consequences.
I confess it was difficult for me to feel regardless of consequences, for I had a haunting fear that the future was going to look dark for Florence Lloyd. And if it should be proved that she was in any way responsible for or accessory to this crime, I knew I should wish I had had nothing to do with discovering that fact. But back of this was an undefined but insistent conviction that the girl was innocent, and that I could prove it. This may have been an inordinate faith in my own powers, or it may have been a hope born of my admiration for the young woman herself.
For there is no doubt, that for the first time in my life I was taking a serious interest in a woman's personality. Heretofore I had been a general admirer of womankind, and I had naturally treated them all with chivalry and respect. But now I had met one whom I desired to treat in a far tenderer way, and to my chagrin I realized that I had no right to entertain such thoughts toward a girl already betrothed.
So I concluded to try my best to leave Florence Lloyd's personality out of the question, to leave my feelings toward her out of the question, and to devote my energies to real work on the case and prove by intelligent effort that I could learn facts from evidence without resorting to the microscopic methods of Fleming Stone. I purposely ignored the fact that I would have been only too glad to use these methods had I the power to do so!
