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Still, I could not help noticing that it was really no exaggeration to call it the purple death.

One of the morgue attendants had called Dr. Leslie aside and a moment later he rejoined us.

“They tell me Haynes has been here,” he reported. “I left word that any visitors were to be carefully watched.”

“Strange,” muttered Kennedy, absorbing Dr. Leslie’s latest information and then looking back at the body, puzzled. “Very strange. Let us go up to the apartment right away.”

Kennedy stowed the little tube in which he had placed the body fluid safely in his pocket and led the way out again to our waiting car.

Delaney had picked out a fashionable neighborhood in which to live. As we entered the bronze grilled door and rode up in the elevator, Kennedy handed each of us a cigar and lighted one himself. I lighted up, too, thinking that perhaps there might be some virtue in tobacco to ward off the unseen perils into which we were going.

The wealthy ranchman, evidently, on his arrival in New York had rented an apartment, furnished, from a lawyer, Ashby Ames, who had gone south on account of his health.

We entered and found that it was a very attractive place that Ames had fitted up. At one side of a library or drawing-room opened out a little glass sun-parlor or conservatory on a balcony. Into it a dining-room opened also. In fact, the living rooms of the whole suite could be thrown into one, with this sun-parlor as a center.

Everything about the apartment was quite up-to-date, also. For instance, I noticed that the little conservatory was lighted brilliantly by a mercury vapor tube that ran around it in a huge rectangle of light.

Dr. Leslie and the police had already ransacked the place and there did not seem to be much likelihood that anything could have escaped them. Still, Kennedy began a searching examination after his own methods, while we waited, gazing at him curiously.

By the frown on his forehead I gathered that he was not meeting with much encouragement, when, suddenly, he withdrew the cigar from his mouth, looked at it critically, puffed again, then moved his lips and tongue as if trying to taste something.

Mechanically I did the same. The cigar had a peculiar flavor. I should have flung it away if Kennedy himself had not given it to me. It was not mere imagination, either. Surely there had been none of that sweetishness about the fragrant Havana when I lighted it on the way up.

“What is the matter?” I asked.

“There’s cyanogen in this room,” Craig remarked keenly, still tasting, as he stood near the sun-parlor.

“Cyanogen?” I repeated.

“Yes, there are artificial aids to the senses that make them much keener than nature has done for us. For instance, if air contains the merest traces of the deadly cyanogen gas–prussic acid, you know–cigar smoke acquires a peculiar taste which furnishes an efficient alarm signal.”

Dr. Leslie’s face brightened as Kennedy proceeded.

“That is something like my idea,” he exclaimed. “I have thought all along that it looked very much like a poisoning case. In fact, the very first impression I had was that it might have been due to a cyanide–or at least some gas like cyanogen.”

Kennedy said nothing, and the coroner proceeded. “And the body looked cyanotic, too, you recall. But the autopsy revealed nothing further. I have even examined the food, as far as I can, but I can’t find anything wrong with it.”

There was a noise at the door, outside in the hall, and Dr. Leslie opened it.

“Dr. Haynes,” he introduced, a moment later.

Haynes was a large man, good-looking, even striking, with a self-assertive manner. We shook hands, and taking our cue from Craig, waited for him to speak.

“It’s very strange what could have carried Delaney off so suddenly,” ventured Haynes a moment later. “I’ve been trying to figure it out myself. But I must admit that so far it has completely stumped me.”

He was pacing up and down the room and I watched him more or less suspiciously. Somehow I could not get the idea out of my head that he had been listening to us outside. Now and then, I fancied, he shot a glance at us, as if he were watching us.

“They tell me at the burial company that you were there today,” put in Dr. Leslie, his eyes fixed on Haynes’ face.

Haynes met his gaze squarely, without flinching. “Yes. I got thinking over what the papers said about the ‘purple death,’ and I thought perhaps I might have overlooked something. But there wasn’t–“

The telephone rang. Haynes seized the receiver before any of the rest of us could get to it. “That must be for me,” he said with a brusque apology. “Why–yes, I am here. Dr. Leslie and Professor Kennedy are up here. No–we haven’t discovered anything new. Yes–I shall keep the appointment. Good-by.”

The conversation had been short, but, to me at least, it seemed that he had contrived to convey a warning without seeming to do so.