“The manager said if you'd go down to the lounge, and knock on the brown door to the right of the stairs, sir, he and the other gent. would be expecting you.” Miller set to work again, extracting tacks from the carpet and replacing them carefully. Pointer seemed to have a good deal of difficulty in finding his way. He roamed around the service-stairs which passed not far from number fourteen, and even opened a door on the ground floor leading from them into the street. Here a couple of muddy foot-prints kept him busy for some minutes. He measured and traced them before he closed the door noiselessly, and experimented with its locks and bolts. Only then did he drift by a series of détours into the lounge and the manager's private suite. The manager poured out a whisky and soda, which the Chief Inspector left untouched. “I'm afraid I must take each of your depositions separately, gentlemen. I'll take your statement first, sir, as I understand it was you who called the manager to No. 14.” Pointer got out his book and rapidly entered the date, August 4th—ten-thirty p.m.—Enterprise Hotel, while the manager left to look up his registers. “My name, Chief, is Augustus P. Beale. I'm a sub-editor of the _New York Universe_.” The police officer inclined his head as though in homage to the mighty journal's name. “Came over on the _Campania_ for a year's holiday last month,—by the way, here's my passport, but don't tell me that photo's a good one. We landed July 20th. I've been in Paris most of the time since with some friends, got lonely when they left, and came to London. Arrived this morning by the boat train—Calais-Dover—and found everything full. Worked my way around to the Enterprise, and was told that here, too, every room was taken. Threw myself upon the manager's breast with my credentials in both hands, and begged him to take pity on my grey hairs and save me from a bench in the park. He thought awhile, and, taking me by the hand, with a heavenly smile, led me to a room, explained that it really belonged to a man who was spending the week-end in the country, but that if I would let it go at that for one night he would fix me up something better in the morning. I accepted with tears of gratitude, and after dinner in their restaurant settled myself down before a gas-fire with a cup of coffee. It was pouring, as you know, and I sat warming my toes and putting down my expenses. A shilling rolled under the wardrobe and I fished for it with my umbrella. Couldn't get it, then I tried to move the wardrobe out. Its weight surprised me. However, I got it away from the wall at last and recovered my shilling. As I straightened up, the light from the little electric torch I was using fell full into the knot-hole, and I caught a glimpse of what certainly looked like a piece of human skin,—bit of a cheek. I touched it. There's only one thing in the world that feels like that, and that's a dead body. That was enough for me. I went off