He swung over to the window and stood looking down for some moments. Then, abruptly, he came back to his desk and pressed a bell. To the man who answered the summons he gave the trinket that Teal had brought him. "Go down to Records," he commanded, "and ask 'em for anything they've got in which anything like this figured." It was only ten minutes before the man returned, bearing with him a small bundle of papers. Storm lighted a cigarette and went through them carefully, and at the end he looked steadily across at Inspector Teal. "Listen," he said. "Just over three months ago a man was found dead by the railway between Priory and Kearsney--that's on the Dover-London line. There were no marks of violence, and since he had a ticket from Dover to Victoria it was supposed that he'd simply fallen out of the train. He was identified as Henri Francois Joubert, a Frenchman domiciled in England, who'd made his fortune on the Stock Exchange--jobbing, you know--about thirty years ago. There'd be no records of the case if it hadn't been for one curious thing. In one of his pockets was this!" He tapped a photograph with his forefinger, and Mr. Teal peered at it with his habitual indifference. It was a picture of a visiting card. In the centre had been sketched a design similar to that on the silver triangle of Prester John, and underneath was roughly scrawled, "_February, 1899_." "Mr. Blaythwayt," said Storm, "has just received through the post a similar card, and all that's written under the triangle is _Harchester_. What do you know about Harchester, Teal?" "One of the biggest and best public schools," said Mr. Teal. "Joe Blaythwayt was educated there." Storm leaned back in his chair and exhaled a thin streamer of smoke. Then he looked at Inspector Teal and smiled. Storm's smile was the most attractive thing about him. It flickered about his lips for a moment as though he didn't want to give it a chance, and then it broke out--irrepressibly boyish. It bubbled over with mischief. Head back and a little to one side, eyes dancing, Storm smiled. "Absurd be catlicked!" Storm said. "Teal, this is going to be Big!" CHAPTER II TITTLE-TATTLE OF MR. TEAL Inspector Teal was that unusual type of man who literally takes both pride and pleasure in his employment. Mr. Teal loved talking shop, and would do so for hours on end if he found a listener on whom his enthusiasm was not wasted. He was never off duty. His leisure hours would always find him sauntering round the preserves of other divisions, listening to gossip in public houses and at coffee stalls, entering queer and unregistered "clubs," and paying friendly calls on eccentric gentlemen not unknown to the Records Office. Criminals, to him, were a race of children--interesting, amusing, and completely human, but occasionally in need of sharp correction. And when necessity demanded that they be chastised, he haled them to their punishment without resentment.