"How do I know?" snarled the colonel. "You ask me these fool questions--do you expect a reply? They're dead, and that's done with. I'd sooner he killed Raoul than made a mess of my room, anyway!" "Why did he do it?" asked Crewe. The colonel growled something about fools and their questions, but offered no explanation. "It may have been a monkey trick to make us change our quarters--the stuff was sulphuretted hydrogen and asafoetida. It may have been just bravado, but if he thinks he can scare me----" He sucked viciously at his cigar end. "I've got workmen in to strip the walls and re-paper the bit that's soiled," he said. "I'll be back there to-night." The colonel threw the end of his cigar from the window and relapsed into moody reverie. When he spoke it was in a more cheerful tone. "Crewe," he said, "that guy at Scotland Yard has given me an idea." "Which guy?" asked Crewe, steadying his voice. "The First Commissioner," said the colonel, lighting another cigar. "He particularly wanted to know if 'Snow' had any relations. Curse 'Snow'!" he said between his teeth, and dropping his mask of urbanity. "I wish he'd--well, it doesn't matter; he's dead, anyway--he's dead." "Relations?" said Crewe. "Did you tell him anything?" "I told him all I knew, and that was very little," said the colonel, "but it struck me that Sir Stanley knows much more about this fellow 'Snow' than we do. At any rate, somebody's been making inquiries, and I guess that somebody is the fellow who settled Raoul." "Jack o' Judgment?" "Jack o' Judgment," repeated the colonel grimly. "You showed 'Snow' Gregory into the gang--what do you know about him?" Crewe shook his head. "Very little," he said. "I met him in Monte Carlo. He was down and out. He seemed a likely fellow--educated, a gentleman and all that sort of thing--and when I found that he'd hit the dope, I thought he'd be the kind of man you might want." The colonel nodded. "He never talked about his relations. The only thing I know was that he had a father or an uncle, who was in India, and I gathered that he had forged his name to a bill. When I arrived in Monte Carlo he was spending the money as fast as he could. I guess that was why he called himself Gregory, for I'm sure it wasn't his name." "You're sure he never spoke of a brother?" "Never," said Crewe; "he never talked about himself at all. He was generally under the influence of dope or was recovering from it." The colonel pushed back his hat and rubbed his forehead. "There must be some way of identifying him," he said. "He came from Oxford, you say?" "Yes, I know that," said Crewe; "he spoke of it once." "What house in Oxford? There are several colleges, aren't there?" "From Balliol," said Crewe. "I distinctly remember him talking about Balliol." "What year would that be?" Crewe reflected. "He left college two years before I met him at Monte Carlo," he said; "that would be----" He gave the year.