“It means that Ottley is a clever man who knows his business; and it means, Mr. Searles, that we must take up this so extraordinary affair where the poor Ottley dropped it!” “What do you propose?” “I propose that you invite yourself to a few days’ holiday, as I have done. You stay here. Do not allow even the doctor to know that you are in the house. The nurse you will have to confide in, I suppose. Mr. Haufmann”--he turned to the latter--“you will occupy your old room. Do not, I beg of you, go outside after dusk upon any consideration. If either of you shall hear it again--the evil whispering--come out by the front door, and keep in the shadow. Carry no light. Above all, do not come out upon the balcony!” “Then you,” I said, “will be unable to stay?” “I shall be so unable,” was the reply; “for I go to Brighton to secure the interview with Miss Greta which the poor Ottley so much required!” “You don’t suggest that she knows----” “She knows no more than we do, Mr. Searles! But I think she holds a clue and does not know that she holds a clue! For an hour I shall slumber--I who, like the tortoise, know that to sleep is to live--I shall slumber beside the sick man’s bed. Then, we shall see!” IV It was a quarter to seven when Moris Klaw entered the sick room. Ottley lay in a trance-like condition, and the eccentric investigator, of whose proceedings the nurse strongly disapproved, settled himself in a split-cane armchair by the bedside, and waving his hand in dismissal to Haufmann and myself, placed a large silk handkerchief over his sparsely covered skull and composed himself for slumber. We left him and tiptoed from the room. “If you hadn’t told me what he’s done in the past,” whispered Haufmann, “I should say our old friend was mad a lot!” The great empty house was eerily silent, and during the time that we sat smoking and awaiting the end of Moris Klaw’s singular telepathic experiment, neither of us talked very much. At eight o’clock the man whose proceedings savoured so much of charlatanism, but whom I knew for one of the foremost criminologists of the world, emerged, spraying his face with verbena. “Ah, gentlemen,” he said, coming in to us, “I have recovered some slight impression”--he tapped his moist forehead--“of that agonizing thought which preceded the unconsciousness of Ottley. I depart. Sometime to-night will come Sir Bartram Vane from Half-Moon Street, the specialist, to confer with the physician who is attending here. Mr. Searles, remain concealed. Not even he must know of your being here; no one outside the house must know. Remember my warnings. I depart.” Behind the thick pebbles his eyes gleamed with some excitement repressed. By singular means, he would seem to have come upon a clue. “Good-night, Mr. Haufmann,” he said. “Good-night, Mr. Searles. To the nurse I have said good-night and she only glared. She thinks I am the mad old fool!”