The Yard has its own short cuts, and after a couple of hours of strenuous trunk-calls, he was able to get into touch with a certain solicitor, a Mr. Russell, of Russell and Son, of Perth, who, when driven into a corner, finally admitted that he acted, since his father's retirement, as legal adviser to the particular branch of Erskines in whom the Yard was interested. “It's about young Erskine who's come over from Canada lately——” This seemed to galvanise the man at the other end. So much so that it was some time before Pointer could get his query through the Scotsman's ejaculations. “He's dead. Suicide apparently. Could you identify the body?” With many repetitions he got a general description of “Eames” over the line. The watch clinched it. The invisible Russell said he would come to town by the earliest possible train. Then followed a little difference of opinion as to the exact meaning of that term, Russell pointing out that he said the earliest _possible_, while Pointer maintained time-tables to be the only standard. He won finally, and Mr. Russell agreed to take the midnight express south, leaving his office in the hands of his father. He arrived at the Yard late the following afternoon, and almost in silence the two men drove to the chamber where “Eames” still lay in his patent ice-coffin. Russell recognised him at once, and the Scotsman's air of almost suspicious reserve—as that of a man whose valuable time might be wasted—left him. Seated in the Chief Inspector's room at the Yard over a glass of his own mixing, Mr. Russell told all that he knew of the young man. “You're quite sure, Mr. Russell, that you recognise the corpse?” Pointer was writing swiftly. So was Watts.