Two blue-liveried attendants kept back the horrified but curious crowd.

Francis, vaguely recognised as being somehow or other connected with the law, was one of the few people allowed to remain whilst a doctor, fetched out from the dancing-room, kneeled over the prostrate form.

He felt that he knew beforehand the horrible verdict which the latter whispered in his ear after his brief examination.
"Quite dead! A ghastly business!" Francis gazed at the hole in the shirt-front, disfigured also by a scorching stain.
"A bullet ?" he asked.
The doctor nodded.
"Fired within a foot of the poor fellow's heart," he whispered.

"The murderer wasn't taking any chances, whoever he was." "Have the police been sent for ?" The head-porter stepped forward.
"There was a policeman within a few yards of the spot, sir," he replied.
"He's gone down to keep every one away from the place where we found the body.

We've telephoned to Scotland Yard for an inspector." The doctor rose to his feet.
"Nothing more can be done," he pronounced.