“I hope,” said I, as I looked anxiously out of our window up King’s Bench Walk, “that our friend, Foxley, will turn up to time, or I shall lose the chance of hearing his story. I must be in court by half-past eleven. The telegram said that he was a parson, didn’t it?” “Yes,” replied Thorndyke. “The Reverend Arthur Foxley.” “Then perhaps this may be he. There is a parson crossing from the Row in this direction, only he has a girl with him. He didn’t say anything about a girl, did he?” “No. He merely asked for the appointment. However,” he added, as he joined me at the window and watched the couple approaching with their eyes apparently fixed on the number above our portico, “this is evidently our client, and punctual to the minute.” In response to the old-fashioned flourish on our little knocker, he opened the inner door and invited the clergyman and his companion to enter; and while the mutual introductions were in progress, I looked critically at our new clients. Mr. Foxley was a typical and favourable specimen of his class: a handsome, refined, elderly gentleman, prim as to his speech, suave and courteous in bearing, with a certain engaging simplicity of manner which impressed me very favourably. His companion I judged to be a parishioner, for she was what ladies are apt to describe as “not quite”; that is to say, her social level appeared to appertain to the lower strata of the middle-class. But she was a fine, strapping girl, very sweet-faced and winsome, quiet and gentle in manner and obviously in deep trouble, for her clear grey eyes--fixed earnestly, almost devouringly, on Thorndyke--were reddened and swimming with unshed tears. “We have sought your aid, Dr. Thorndyke,” the clergyman began, “on the advice of my friend, Mr. Brodribb, who happened to call on me on some legal business. He assured me that you would be able to solve our difficulties if it were humanly possible, so I have come to lay those difficulties before you. I pray to God that you may be able to help us, for my poor young friend here, Miss Markham, is in a most terrible position, as you will understand when I tell you that her future husband, a most admirable young man named Robert Fletcher, is in the custody of the police, charged with robbery and murder.” Thorndyke nodded gravely, and the clergyman continued: