The cheap and smelling paraffin lamp being lit, I took a hasty glance around the poor man's home. There was but little furniture save the bed, a chair or two, and a rickety table. Upon the latter was one of those flat bottles known as a "quartern." Our first attention, however, was to the prostrate man. A single glance was sufficient to show that he was dead. His eyes were closed, his hands clenched, and his body was bent as though he had expired in a final paroxysm of agony. The teeth, too, were hard set, and there were certain features about his appearance that caused me to entertain grave suspicion from the first. His thin, consumptive face, now blanched, was strangely drawn, as though the muscles had suddenly contracted, and there was an absence of that composure one generally expects to find in the faces of those who die naturally. As a medical man I very soon noted sufficient appearances to tell me that death had been due either to suicide or foul play. The former seemed to me the most likely. "Well?" asked Ambler, rising from his knees when I had concluded the examination of the dead man's skinny, ill-nourished body. "What's your opinion, Ralph?" "He's taken poison," I declared. "Poison? You believe he's been poisoned." "It may have been wilful murder, or he may have taken it voluntarily," I answered. "But it is most evident that the symptoms are those of poisoning." Ambler gave vent to a low grunt, half of satisfaction, half of suspicion. I knew that grunt well. When on the verge of any discovery he always emitted that guttural sound. "We'd better inform the police," I remarked. "That's all we can do. The poor fellow is dead." "Dead! Yes, we know that. But we must find out who killed him." "Well," I said, "I think at present, Ambler, we've quite sufficient on our hands without attempting to solve any further problems. The poor man may have been in despair and have taken poison wilfully." "In despair!" echoed the old man. "No fear. Lanky was happy enough. 'E wasn't the sort of fellow to hurry hisself out o' the world. He liked life too jolly well. Besides, he 'ad a tidy bit o' money in the Savin's Bank. 'E was well orf once, wer' Lanky. Excuse me for interruptin'." "Well, if he didn't commit suicide," I remarked, "then, according to all appearances, poison was administered to him wilfully." "That appears to be the most feasible theory," Ambler said. "Here we have still a further mystery."