A silence of troubled thoughts fell upon the three.

Miss Cornelia took out her knitting.
"Did you ever try knitting when you wanted to think ?" she queried sweetly, after a pause in which the detective tramped from one side of the room to the other, brows knotted, eyes bent on the floor.
"No," grunted the detective.

He took out a cigar--bit off the end with a savage snap of teeth--lit it--resumed his pacing.
"You should, sometimes," continued Miss Cornelia, watching his troubled movements with a faint light of mockery in her eyes.

"I find it very helpful." "I don't need knitting to think straight," rasped Anderson indignantly.
Miss Cornelia's eyes danced.
"I wonder!" she said with caustic affability.

"You seem to have so much evidence left over." The detective paused and glared at her helplessly.
"Did you ever hear of the man who took a clock apart--and when he put it together again, he had enough left over to make another clock ?" she twitted.
The detective, ignoring the taunt, crossed quickly to Dale.
"What do you mean by saying that paper isn't where you put it ?" he demanded in tones of extreme severity.