“Such valuable curios,” he rumbled, “have histories--and the crimes they occasion operate in cycles.” He waved his hand in a slow circle. “If I but knew the history of this harp! Mr. Coram!” He glanced toward my friend. “Thoughts are things, Mr. Coram. If I might spend a night here--upon the very spot of floor where the poor Conway fell--I could from the surrounding atmosphere (it is a sensitive plate) recover a picture of the thing in his mind”--indicating Conway--“at the last!” The Scotland Yard man blew down his nose. “You snort, my friend,” said Moris Klaw, turning upon him. “You would snort less if you had waked screaming, out in the desert; screaming out with fear of the dripping beaks of the vultures--the last dreadful fear which the mind had known of him who had died of thirst upon that haunted spot!” The words and the manner of their delivery thrilled us all. “What is it,” continued the weird old man, “but the odic force, the ether--say it how you please--which carries the wireless message, the lightning? It is a huge, subtile, sensitive plate. Inspiration, what you call bad luck and good luck--all are but reflections from it. The supreme thought preceding death is imprinted on the surrounding atmosphere like a photograph. I have trained this”--he tapped his brow--“to reproduce those photographs! May I sleep here to-night, Mr. Coram?” Somewhere beneath the ramshackle exterior we had caught a glimpse of a man of power. From behind the thick pebbles momentarily had shone out the light of a tremendous and original mind. “I should be most glad of your assistance,” answered my friend. “No police must be here to-night,” rumbled Moris Klaw. “No heavy-footed constables, filling the room with thoughts of large cooks and small Basses, must fog my negative!” “Can that be arranged?” asked Coram of the inspector. “The men on duty can remain in the hall, if you wish it, sir.” “Good!” rumbled Moris Klaw. He moistened his brow with verbena, bowed uncouthly, and shuffled from the Greek Room. III Moris Klaw reappeared in the evening, accompanied by a strikingly beautiful brunette. The change of face upon the part of Mr. Grimsby of New Scotland Yard was singular. “My daughter--Isis,” explained Moris Klaw. “She assists to develop my negatives.” Grimsby became all attention. Leaving two men on duty in the hall, Moris Klaw, his daughter, Grimsby, Coram, and I went up to the Greek Room. Its darkness was relieved by a single lamp. “I’ve had the stones in the Athenean Harp examined by a lapidary,” said Coram. “It occurred to me that they might have been removed and paste substituted. It was not so, however.” “No,” rumbled Klaw. “I thought of that, too. No visitors have been admitted here during the day?” “The Greek Room has been closed.” “It is well, Mr. Coram. Let no one disturb me until my daughter comes in the morning.” Isis Klaw placed a red silk cushion upon the spot where the dead man had lain.