The Paradise Mystery

e looked at it carefully, folded it neatly, and put it away in his pocket-book; after that he proceeded to collect a few possessions of his own, instruments, book

n!" he

tly ajar; instead, the knock was repeated, and at

n and lined face, thin grey hair and tired eyes; this was a man, he said to himself, who had seen trouble. Nevertheless, not a poor man, if his general appearance was anything to go by-he was well and even expensively dressed, in the style generally affected by well-to-do merchants and

hin?" asked the stranger. "I

"Just gone out-not five minutes ago.

looking beyond Br

onal services-I just called to see Dr. Ransford-I-the fact is,

side and pointed

eanery-he has a case there. If you went through Paradise, you'd very likely

lowed Bryce's ou

aid, wonderingly

ey wall which projected from the sout

wilderness-why called Paradise I don't know. There's a short cut across it to the Deanery and that part of t

o you," said the st

ryce had indicated, and Bryce went back

ll I say you'll call again?

ger shook

ered. "I'll see him-somewh

arations for departure. And in the course of things, he more than once looked through the win

's badly mistaken-it'll be time enough to say farewell when I take my departure-and that won't be just yet. Now I wonder who that old chap was? Knew some one of Ransford's name once, did he? Probably Ransford himself-i

just parted from young Bonham in the garden and was about to visit her dogs in the stable yard, came along: she and Bryce met, face to face. The girl flushed, not so muc

the spoons," he remarked. "I go-with my small be

sweeping by him with a highly displeased glance

"But-there is no malice in it? Your ange

replied. "As I just said, I have

d Bryce. "The phrase is one of much

nsider some of them as he stepped out of the Close into the ancient enclosure which all Wrychester folk knew by its time-honoured name of Paradise. This was really an outer court of the old cloisters; its high walls, half-ruinous, almost wholly covered with ivy, shut in an expanse of turf, liberally furnished with yew and cypress and studded with tombs and gravestones. In one corner rose a gigantic elm; in another a broken stairway of stone led to a doorway set high in the walls of the nave; across the enclosure itself was a pathway which led towards the houses in the south-east corner of the

ing figure. "Now what is it in that man's mere presence that's upset Rans

ed across Paradise at last and made his way towards the farther corner. There was a little wicket-gate there, set in the ivied wall; as Bryce opened it, a man in the working dress of a stone-mason,

asked Bryce calmly.

rehead as if he were dazed, and then

rytha's Stair there, doctor. Dead-

rner's arm and

what?" he

ere. He fell right over the steps-crash!" Bryce looked over the tops of the yews and cypresses at the doorway in the clerest

exclaimed. "Thrown-down

some repairs doing-and the jackdaws were making such a to-do up there by the roof I glanced up at them. And I

who flung him

Varner. "I was more for watching him! He sort of tottered for a second on the step outside t

ince?" dema

to him-I've been doing what I could. But I s

rds the bushes by whi

him," he sai

y the angle of nave and transept, on a broad pavement of flagstones, lay the body of a man crumpled up in a curiously twisted position. And

rner, suddenly point

ccurred. Then came stillness. "That's the end!" he muttered. "The man's dead! I'll guarantee that before I put a

lf-fearfully, at the dead man. Then he glanced upw

said. "And he came down with such vio

You'd better fetch some of the cathedral people-some of the vergers. No!" he broke off suddenly, as the low strains of an organ came from within the great b

the clerestory of the Cathedral-as they easily could, by more than one door, by more than one stair-and supposing they had quarrelled, and one of them had flung or pushed the other through the door above-what then? And on the heels of that thought hurried another-this man, now lying dead, had come to the surgery, seeking Ransford, and had subsequently gone away, presumably i

nsept; on the other, the cypresses and yews rising amongst the old tombs and monuments. Assuring himself that no one was near, no eye watching, he slipped his hand into the inner breast pocket of the dead man's smart morning c

nts a scrap of paper folded curiously, after the fashion of the cocked-hat missives of another age in which envelopes had not been invented. Bryce hurriedly unfolded this, and after one glance at its contents, made haste to secrete it in his own pocket. He had only just done this and put back the purse when

him. Broken-all to pieces, I should say-neck and spi

ick of movement, nodded, and after one glance at the

sked, turning to Varn

"Least-ways, it's been open, like tha

ehind it?" inqui

lery-that's what it is. People can go up there and walk around-lots of 'em do-to

ne of the two constable

a quiet look around, along that gallery, especially near the door there-and come back here." He looked down at the dead man again as the mason and the

d whoever threw the man through that doorway no doubt knew how to slip away unobserved. Now, you'll have to remove the body to the mortuary, of course

he had left not twenty minutes before. He had but one idea as he ran-he wanted to see Ransford face to face with the de

with his usual quietness of touch. And on the threshold he paused. Ransford, the very pi