"What was the matter with him?" I enquired. "Was he off his chump?" The lawyer shrugged his shoulders. "More or less, I should think. At least, it's difficult to account for his conduct any other way. Up till then he had been living the life of an ordinary middle-aged man about town. One doesn't throw up all that sort of thing suddenly and go and bury oneself in a God-forsaken place like Greensea unless one's got a screw loose somewhere." He paused. "Besides," he added, "there's no doubt that his mind gave way during his last illness. He was quite incapable of recognising me when I went down to see him, and, according to Dr. Manning, he remained in exactly the same state until he died." "When was that?" I enquired. "You didn't tell me in your cable." Once again Mr. Drayton referred to his papers. "He was taken ill suddenly on March the twenty-third. I think he got a chill, or something of the sort; anyhow, Bascomb wired to me the next day that he was very seedy, and I ran down there in the afternoon. I found him delirious, and altogether about as bad as anyone could possibly be. Bascomb had got hold of a doctor--a fellow called Manning, who spends most of his time on a barge in the river, which he has fitted up as a kind of shooting-box. He doesn't practise as a rule, but when he saw how urgent the matter was he had very kindly come over and taken up his quarters in the house. He seemed to be doing everything that was possible, and as he declared that he was quite ready to stay there as long as he was wanted I decided to leave the case in his hands. "I heard nothing more for two days; then, on the afternoon of the twenty-eighth, I got a telegram to say that your uncle had died rather unexpectedly in the morning. I sent back a wire to say I would come down at once. In a strictly legal sense I had no real authority to act, but, since there appeared to be nobody else, I thought I had better take the responsibility. "Dr. Manning was still in the house when I arrived, which of course simplified matters to a very great extent. He had been in charge of the case since the beginning, so there was no need for an inquest or anything of that sort. He was able to certify that the cause of death was heart failure on the top of double pneumonia, and between us we fixed up all the necessary arrangements for the funeral. "The next thing I did was to go through your uncle's papers. I knew very little about him, and I hoped that I might come across something which would put me in touch with his family. He had never given me the faintest hint about his private affairs--except for once mentioning that he had a nephew called John Dryden, whom he believed to be his next of kin.