As soon as I had recovered my temper, I looked at the time-table. We had reached Waterbank at five minutes past one. By good luck, the next train was due at forty-four minutes past one, and arrived at Yateland (the next station) ten minutes afterward. I could only hope that Priscilla would look at the time-table too, and wait for me. If I had attempted to walk the distance between the two places, I should have lost time instead of saving it. The interval before me was not very long; I occupied it in looking over the town. Speaking with all due respect to the inhabitants, Waterbank (to other people) is a dull place. I went up one street and down another--and stopped to look at a shop which struck me; not from anything in itself, but because it was the only shop in the street with the shutters closed. A bill was posted on the shutters, announcing that the place was to let. The outgoing tradesman's name and business, announced in the customary painted letters, ran thus: _James Wycomb, Cutler, etc._ For the first time, it occurred to me that we had forgotten an obstacle in our way, when we distributed our photographs of the knife. We had none of us remembered that a certain proportion of cutlers might be placed, by circumstances, out of our reach--either by retiring from business or by becoming bankrupt. I always carried a copy of the photograph about me; and I thought to myself, "Here is the ghost of a chance of tracing the knife to Mr. Deluc!" The shop door was opened, after I had twice rung the bell, by an old man, very dirty and very deaf. He said "You had better go upstairs, and speak to Mr. Scorrier--top of the house." I put my lips to the old fellow's ear-trumpet, and asked who Mr. Scorrier was. "Brother-in-law to Mr. Wycomb. Mr. Wycomb's dead. If you want to buy the business apply to Mr. Scorrier." Receiving that reply, I went upstairs, and found Mr. Scorrier engaged in engraving a brass door-plate. He was a middle-aged man, with a cadaverous face and dim eyes After the necessary apologies, I produced my photograph. "May I ask, sir, if you know anything of the inscription on that knife?" I said. He took his magnifying glass to look at it. "This is curious," he remarked quietly. "I remember the queer name--Zebedee. Yes, sir; I did the engraving, as far as it goes. I wonder what prevented me from finishing it?" The name of Zebedee, and the unfinished inscription on the knife, had appeared in every English newspaper. He took the matter so coolly that I was doubtful how to interpret his answer. Was it possible that he had not seen the account of the murder? Or was he an accomplice with prodigious powers of self-control? "Excuse me," I said, "do you read the newspapers?" "Never! My eyesight is failing me. I abstain from reading, in the interests of my occupation." "Have you not heard the name of Zebedee mentioned--particularly by people who do read the newspapers?"