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Ethel.
    Harry tightened angrily. Oh, sure, the thought came. Go look. As if he was a big hero or something. As if . . .
    Drawing in a shaky breath, he started up the staircase. That man was awfully big. Awfully big.
    At the third-floor landing, he stopped and braced himself, one hand resting on the bannister. All right, mister, his mind rehearsed sternly, what do you want up here? You got business? He swallowed again. By Christ, he thought.
    He stepped forward quickly, snapping back the hammer of the derringer so that the curved trigger came clicking down to his finger.
    The hall was empty.
    Harry blinked. Well, what the hell? he thought. What in the blue blazes?
    â€œHarry!”
    He started violently, his heartbeat lurching so violently it felt like a horse’s kick against his chest wall. Whirling, he thudded down the steps, derringer extended.
    â€œCome here!” called Ethel. It was not exactly a call of distress, it seemed to Harry, but then you never knew how someone like Ethel might react in a moment of danger. Maybe even sudden peril would fail to alter her habit of demanding.
    But she was all right, standing at the end of the hallway by the window. Harry walked toward her quickly, testing the door to Professor’s Dodge’s room as he passed. It was locked.
    â€œWhat is it?” he asked.
    â€œYou leave this window open?” Ethel asked, and there was something in her voice other than demand, Harry noticed.
    He had said no before it struck him what the import was of his saying it. He stared out the window at the precipitous drop to the street below.
    â€œYou . . . think he
jumped
?” he asked.
    Ethel pressed her lips together. “That’s
impossible
,” she said angrily.
    They both looked out the window. Could a man jump that far? wondered Harry. Wouldn’t it break his legs?
    Then Ethel said, “
Harry
,” in a faint voice.
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œLook.”
    His gaze fell to where she was pointing, and he saw the imprint of boot tracks ending at the window.
    Harry gaped. There was a swelling in his chest and stomach as if all his organs were expanding. No, there had to be another explanation, his mind claimed instantly. No man could jump twenty-five feet to the ground nor could he climb along a wall that was devoid of footholds or handholds.
    â€œ
Of course
,” he said, speaking before his mind was set.
    â€œWhat?” There was a rare sound of grateful attention in Ethel’s voice.
    â€œHe’s in the perfessor’s room,” said Harry.
    â€œBut you said the door was locked,” she objected weakly.
    â€œSure.” He plunged on, unwilling to allow the sight of those boot prints to distract him. “He locked it from the inside after he went in. He must have a skeleton key.”
    â€œBut—what about the window then?”
    â€œDon’t you see?” he argued. “He tried to trick us. He opened it up to make us think that was the way he left.”
    â€œI don’t—” She stared at him blankly. Then, abruptly, she pointed at the boot prints. “What about them?” she asked.
    â€œThat’s a trick, too,” said Harry, trying to outtalk the speed of fear. “He could walk to the window, open it, then move backwards in the same prints. That’s an old Injun trick.”
    He snapped his fingers, making Ethel twitch.
    â€œHe
is
an Injun!” he said. “I thought so when I seen him.”
    â€œAn
Indian
?”
    They both looked at each other intently, and suddenly Harry knew what she was going to say and it made him cold inside.
    â€œWe’ll have to look,” she told him.
    A shuddered breath passed Harry’s lips.
We’ll have to look.
The words echoed in his mind.
    â€œYou have the key?” she asked.
    Harry tried to swallow.
    â€œWell, have you?”
    He murmured, “Yeah.”
    â€œThen . . .”
    No more to be said. The two