It is a pretty house. Mother’s taste in people may be catholic, but in houses and furnishings she knows her stuff. And except that Larry had left the front door standing open it looked as quiet and orderly as ever. Mother gave one look around and then climbed the stairs. That is, she got almost up and stopped.

Isabel was lying on the landing, and there was no doubt that she was dead. She lay on her back, her arms outstretched, and except that one of her bedroom mules was off there was no sign of any struggle. Her lovely dark hair was spread over the carpet, making a frame for her face, and one arm was out of her dressing gown, as though she had been putting it on when she met her murderer.

Not that I noticed that then. All I could see was the small spot of blood on the front of her silk nightgown.

Mother stood very still, looking down at her. Then she reached down and touched the hand nearest to her. She drew back, and I knew Isabel really was dead. Neither of us said anything. Then Mother sank down on the stairs, as if she felt faint, and when Larry came pounding back she was still there. She wouldn’t move to let him pass.

“There is nothing you can do,” she said. “Go down and call the police. I’m here.”

I went down to the porch with Larry. Alma was standing there, looking like death, and a few moments later I heard the siren. A police car swung in on two wheels and stopped with the engine still going. Two uniformed men leaped out. One of them touched his cap.

“I understand you’ve had some trouble here,” he said.

Larry braced himself.

“We have. My wife …” He choked and did not finish.

They pushed past us and into the house, to see Mother sitting on the stairs. She was holding that wretched diamond collar. In her glittering gold-brocade dress and with her bright red hair she completely stopped them. They stood gazing up at her. “My daughter-in-law is here,” she said. “I’m afraid somebody has stabbed her.”

“Is she badly hurt?”

“She is dead.”

She let them pass then, but she stayed where she was. Behind me I heard Larry groan, and I turned and went back to him. I got him into the library, although he would not sit down. He paced the floor, looking like a wild man and saying over and over: “Who would do it? She had no enemies. Who would do it?” I think he didn’t even know he was speaking, or that I was there.

It was only a minute or so before one of the officers came down the stairs to the telephone. He hung up and looked at Larry.

“Who found her?” he asked.

Larry tried to explain, but he made so bad a job of it that I took it over. I told about the party for the Mayor, the two hundred people, the orchestra, the forty extra waiters, even the Mayor’s screaming escort. And I told about Larry’s coming home to find Isabel dead. He looked bewildered.