"Tell them!" she cried wildly.
Forden seemed to have maintained his composure only by a
superhuman effort.
"The--body is--at my office," he said, as we faced him with
deathlike stillness. "Phelps had told us to get him within ten
days. We did get him, finally. Gentlemen, you, who were seeking
murderers, are, in effect, murderers. You kept us away two days
too long. It was too late. We could not revive him. Phelps is
really dead!"
"The deuce!" exclaimed Andrews, "the policy is incontestible!"
As he turned to us in disgust, his eyes fell on Anginette Phelps,
sobered down by the terrible tragedy and nearly a physical wreck
from real grief.
"Still," he added hastily, "we'll pay without a protest."
She did not even hear him. It seemed that the butterfly in her was
crushed, as Dr. Forden and Miss Tracy gently led her away.
They had all left, and the laboratory was again in its normal
state of silence, except for the occasional step of Kennedy as he
stowed away the apparatus he had used.
"I must say that I was one of the most surprised in the room at
the outcome of that case," I confessed at length.
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