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"And that is as far as we ever got. The coroner's jury brought in
a verdict of death by means of a stab from some unknown weapon in
the hand of a person also unknown, but no weapon was ever found,
nor was it ever settled how the attack could have been made or the
murderer escape under the conditions described. The woman was poor,
her friends few, and the case seemingly inexplicable. So after
creating some excitement by its peculiarities, it fell of its own
weight. But I remembered it, and in many a spare hour have tried
to see my way through the no-thoroughfare it presented. But quite
in vain. To-day, the road is as blind as ever, but -" here
Sweetwater's face sharpened and his eyes burned as he leaned closer
and closer to the older detective -" but this second case, so unlike
the first in non-essentials but so exactly like it in just those
points which make the mystery, has dropped a thread from its tangled
skein into my hand, which may yet lead us to the heart of both.
Can you guess - have you guessed - what this thread is? But how
could you without the one clew I have not given you? Mr. Gryce,
the tenement where this occurred is the same I visited the other
night in search of Mr. Brotherson. And the man characterised at
that time by the janitor as the best, the quietest and most
respectable tenant in the whole building, and the one you remember
whose window opened directly opposite the spot where this woman lay
dead, was Mr. Dunn himself, or, in other words, our late redoubtable
witness, Mr. Orlando Brotherson."
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