"We'll go to the hall now. Katherine will go on upstairs. She mustn't see you enter the room, but she will
watch in the corridor while you are there to be sure you aren't disturbed. You and I will chat for awhile with
the others, Bobby, then you will go up. You understand? Paredes mustn't even guess what you are doing. I'll
keep him and Groom downstairs. If he spied, if he knew what you were at, he'd have a weapon in his hands I'd
hate to think about. He may be all right, but we can't risk any more than we have to. We must go on tiptoe."
He opened the door. Katherine gave Bobby's hand a quick, encouraging pressure.
"Take the stuff to my room," Graham whispered. "The first chance, we'll destroy it so that no trace will be
left."
They went to the hall. Without speaking, Katherine climbed the stairs. Graham drew a chair between Paredes
and the doctor. Bobby lounged against the mantel, trying to find in the Panamanian's face some clue as to his
real feelings. But Paredes's eyes were closed. His hand drooped across the chair arm. His slender, pointed
fingers held, as if from mere habit, a lifeless cigarette.
"Asleep," Graham whispered.
Without opening his eyes Paredes spoke: "No; I feel curiously awake." He yawned.
Doctor Groom glanced at his watch. "The powers of prosecution," he grumbled, "ought to be here within the
next fifteen or twenty minutes."
Bobby glanced at Graham. Then it wasn't safe to delay too long. More and more as he waited he shrank from
the invasion of the room of death. The prospect of reaching out and touching the still, cold thing on the bed
revolted him. Was there anything in that room capable of forbidding his intention? Was there, in short, a surer,
more malicious force for evil than his unconscious self, at work in the house? He was about to make some
formal comment to the others, to embark on his distasteful adventure, when Paredes, as if he had read Bobby's
mind, opened his eyes, languidly left his chair, and walked to the foot of the stairs.
"Where you going?" Graham asked sharply.
Paredes waved his hand indifferently and walked on up. There was something of stealth in his failure to reply,
in his cat-like tread on the stairs. Graham and Bobby stared after him, unable to meet this new situation
audibly because of Groom. Yet five minutes had gone. There was no time to be lost. Paredes mustn't rob
Bobby of his chance. With a sort of desperation he started for the stairs. Graham held out his hand as if to
restrain him, then nodded. Bobby had his foot on the first step when Katherine's cry reached them, shaping the
moment to their use. For there was no fright in her cry. It was, rather, angry. And Bobby and Graham ran up
while Doctor Groom remained in his chair, an expression of blank amazement on his face.
A candle burned on the table in the upper hall. Katherine and Paredes stood near the entrance of the old
corridor. Paredes, as usual, was quite unruffled. Katherine's attitude was defensive. She seemed to hold the
corridor against him. The anger of her cry was active in her eyes. Paredes laughed lightly.
"Sorry to have given the household one more shock. Fortunately no harm done."
"What is it, Katherine?" Graham demanded.
"I don't know," she answered. "He startled me. He entered the corridor."
Paredes nodded