"Then," stated Professor Brierly, "that is the place to begin, as soon as we know what we are looking for. One of you gentlemen, I am certain, can obtain the necessary permission to have me verify the official verdict of suicide. When we have done that, we shall have cleared away much doubt and uncertainty." His speech was now crisp, clear, incisive. "Is there any reason why we cannot do this at once?" "No," said Justice Higginbotham slowly, "there is not. But we are waiting to hear from the only one of our members unaccounted for,--Wrigley." Jimmy noticed that while their mood had lightened during the past few minutes in the interchange with Professor Brierly, the mention of the name of the missing member brought back the atmosphere of gloom and doubt. "Tell me all you care to tell me, Judge, of the inception of your group. Sometimes talking about a thing to an outsider helps. You gentlemen have brooded on this too long. Let us see if we can help clear it up." Justice Higginbotham told in elaborate detail what McCall had sketched briefly. His deep voice, the remarkable voice that had handed down so many important decisions from the highest tribunal in the land, rolled on, with the gentle lapping of the waters of the lake against the small wharf, a faint obligate Jimmy was to remember this scene for a long time; it was etched on his memory very clearly. He sensed that the old jurist was talking against time. While he seemed absorbed in his tale as were the others, this absorption was only superficial. With their inner senses they all seemed to be waiting, waiting for the dread news of their missing comrade. These old men, everyone of whom showed his uneasiness in his own way, had each lived more than three-quarters of a century. Some of them showed their age very distinctly, mentally and physically. Jimmy could see their attention wander from the absorbing tale as Justice Higginbotham unfolded it, one of the most glamorous that Jimmy had ever heard. Suddenly, in the middle of a sentence, Justice Higginbotham stopped talking. From the room facing on the porch there had come the faint whirring that was a prelude to the striking of the old-fashioned clock. Then came the deep tones of the hour. Jimmy remembered now that when the clock had struck an hour before there had come the telephone message appraising the group of the death of Morris Miller. The last stroke was still reverberating when the staccato jangling of the telephone bell drew a number of the old men to their feet. As if by a common impulse, as if they expected to get the answer to their spoken question through their eyes, every person on the deep porch, turned in the direction of the telephone. They looked as if they expected to see the dread message or messenger through the walls between them and the instrument. The white-headed, grizzled negro came to the door. He spoke to Justice Higginbotham: "Fo' you, suh. Je'sey City callin'."