The Birmingham age-herald., 1923-03-11


 less one. However, he had the consolation of knowing that the entries in the diaries would furnish sufficient grounds upon which to demand new trial for the dead mans daughter In the period of respite thus obtained, wonders might be accom- plished.
 Bristow descended to the library to con- tinue his investigations. Nothing further rewarded his Investigations Nothing fur ther rewarded his search. Lighting cigar, he seated himself in an arm chair and began to sum up this new and hopeful phase of the case. It was an expressing subject, and he grew more hopeful with the thinking of it.
 The disquieting thought that Nerissa might, after all, be the slayer of her father was banished forever. Love looked upon him with less tragic mask.
 The old house was full of those noisome sounds which the mind conjures out of noe turnal solitude. He felt strange, unac- countable nervousness creeping over him. The striking of the town clock, pealing the hour of midnight, made him start as though he himself had been struck. Suddenly he imagined he heard footfall in the house. He listened tensely for a moment, but the sound was not repeated.
 His mind went backward and forward over the chain of evidence as it now ap- peared, testing each link in turn. He thought he saw hope ahead without the introduction of evidence that would cast a mantle of shame over the girls life. Grad ually his head fell back. He was drifting into the mystic borderland between con- sciousness and slumber when he fancied he heard a repetition of the sound which had attracted his attention few moments be- fore. The next instant from the direction of the study upstairs came the sound of a heavy fall.
 Bristow sprang to his feet and listened intently. The noise was not repeated, and the lawyer made his way rapidly but eau tiously upstairs. As he neared the study he noted that the door he had closed stood open and that the lamp he had extinguished before leaving the room had been relighted.
 Entering the apartment, he cast a quick, startled glance about him. Every thing was in perfect order nowhere was there indication of struggle. But, lying face downward on the floor in front of the big, carved chair was the form of gray haired man clad in dressing gown.
 Kneeling beside the prostrate figure, which appeared startlingly familiar to him, he turned the man over until the light fell pealed from his lips.
 Lying before him, apparently dead, was Col. Judson Bainbridge!
 On the evening succeeding the conclusion of the testimony in the case against Ne rissa Selden, the accused girl was pacing the floor of her cell, her mind busy with the apparently hopeless problem of estab- fishing her innocence.
 She was puzzled and dismayed by the at titude assumed by the housekeeper. Miss Wrightson ostensibly had been as mother to her, and the venom which had pervaded the womans testimony mystified as we'll as grieved the girl. Now she was seeking with all her keen mentality to pierce the veil of mystery that shrouded the actions of the housekeeper and obscured the es- sentials to her acquittal.
 Walking the floor feverishly, then paus- ing for minutes at time to mentally ar que some point, she fitted together the bits of evidence on which to build theory. Supplying a link here and there when the connection was interrupted, she constructed plausible framework.
 Mentally rehearsing her last interview with Bristow when he had disclosed his suspicious of Miss Wrightson and the strange aversion manifested by Dr. Craig for his, Bristow's theory, she connected it with the fact formerly placed in her pos