heavy, upholstered chair back into position. His moving of similar
articles of furniture had made the sounds heard by Murphy.

Stepping suddenly into the room, Murphy inquired, with a note of
sarcasm in his voice, "Kind of busy, ain't you?"

Marsh turned abruptly. If they expected to see any signs of
confusion on his face they were disappointed, for he simply smiled
cheerfully.

"Just following out a line of thought," he answered.

"What's the big idea!" asked the plain-clothes man, suspiciously, as
he also stepped into the room and carefully looked over the man
before him.

"Well, detectives in novels always search minutely for things which
may not be apparent to the eye. When confronted with so deep a
mystery as this one, I thought the application of a little of the
story book stuff might do no harm."

"Huh!" snorted the plain-clothes man, as Marsh finished giving this
information. "You're more than commonly interested in this affair,
ain't you?"

"Naturally," agreed Marsh. "Remember, I live just below, and
wouldn't like to be murdered in my bed some night. To hear a murder
over your head is a bit disconcerting."

"How the devil do we know there's been a murder?" shot back the